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r O o' 











ADVENTURES IN 
SILENCE 


BY 

HERBERT W. COLLINGWOOD 


Distributed by 

THE RURAL NEW YORKER 

333 WEST 30th STREET 
NEW YORK 


% 



Copyright 1923 

By Herbert W. Collingwood 


Printed in U. S. A. 


©C1A759699 

NOV "5 ’23 


•Xa S 


I 


V 

Ni 

\ 

V 

k 

Cj 

i 

{ 


TO E. W. C. 

WHOSE RARE SYMPATHY AND 
SISTERLY UNDERSTANDING HAVE 
HELPED ONE DEAF MAN THROUGH 
THE SILENCE. 
















INTRODUCTION 


There are in this country about 75,000 people who 
were never able to hear. There are also about half a 
million who have lost all or part of their hearing, and 
more than one million in addition who must use 
some contrivance to aid their ears. This army, 
nearly as large as the one sent overseas, is forced 
to live a strange and mysterious life, which most 
normal persons know nothing about, even though 
they come into daily contact with the outposts. The 
ordinary deaf man is usually regarded as a joke or 
a nuisance, according to the humor of his associates. 
This social condition is largely due to the fact that 
he has found no place in literature; he occupies an 
abnormal position because his story has never been 
fairly told. The lame, the halt and the blind have 
been driven or gently led into literature. Poem, 
essay and story have described their lives, their 
habits, their needs; as a result the average person 
of reasonable intelligence has a fair notion of what 
it is like to be crippled or blind. But no one tells 
wliat it is like to be deaf. No one seems to love a 
deaf man well enough to analyze his thought or to 
describe the remarkable world in which he must 
live apart, although he may be close enough to his 
companions to touch them and to see their every 
action. Very likely this is our own fault; perhaps 
we have no right to expect the public to do for us 

3 


4 


INTRODUCTION 


wliat we should do for ourselves. I have long felt 
that we are sadly handicapped socially through this 
failure to put our life and our strange adventures 
into literature—the deaf person must remain a joke 
or a tragedy until he has made the world see some¬ 
thing of the finer side of his life in the silence. This 
is why I have attempted to record these “adven¬ 
tures.” I am aware that it is rather a crude pioneer 
performance. Beginnings are rarely impressive. 
Much as we respect the pioneer of years ago, very 
few of us would care to house and entertain him 
today. It is my hope that this volume will lead 
other deaf persons to record their experiences, so 
that we may present our case fully to the public. 
The great trouble is that we find it so easy to make a 
genuine “tale of woe” out of our experience; it is 
hardly possible to avoid this if we record honestly. 
Perhaps we “enjoy the thought of our affliction” so 
thoroughly that we do not realize that the reading 
public has no use for it. My own method of avoiding 
this has been to turn the manuscript over to my 
daughter and to walk away from it, leaving her 
entirely free to cut the “grouch” out of it with the 
happy instruments of youth and hope and music. 
With us the great adventure of life is to pass con¬ 
tentedly from the world of sound into the world of 
silence and there strive to prepare ourselves for the 
world of serenity which lies beyond. 


H. W. COLLINGWOOD. 


CONTENTS 


Introduction . 3 

Terrors that are Imaginary. 9 

On the Road to Silence. 20 

Head Noises and Subjective Audition. 38 

Facing the Hard Situation. 52 

A Heart for Any Fate. 73 

Memories of Early Life. 87 

Experimenting With the Deaf Man. 101 

Companions in Trouble. 116 

The Approach to Silence. 133 

Mixing Word Meanings. 147 

The Whispering Wire. 160 

“No Music in Himself”. 178 

Silence Not Always Golden . 194 

Cases of Mistaken Identity. 210 

All in a Lifetime. 223 

“Such Tricks Hath Strong Imagination”.. 239 
“The Terror That Flieth By Night” .256 

“Grouch” or Gentleman. 274 

5 






























ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 




CHAPTER I 


Terrors That Are Imaginary 

The World of Silence Uncharted—Two Initial Incidents, 
Darkness in the Tunnel, and at Home—Imaginary Terrors 
of the Deaf—When John Harlow Thought He Was a 
Murderer. 

For some years I have considered writing a book 
concerning the life of the deaf or the “hard of hear¬ 
ing.” It is hard to understand why our peculiar 
and interesting life in the silent world has not been 
more fully recorded. We read of adventures in 
strange lands, far away, yet here is a stranger 
country close by, with its mysteries and miseries 
uncharted. Having lived in this silent world for 
some years, I have often planned to make an effort 
to describe it. However, like many other writers, 
1 could not get going. I was not able to start my 
story until two rather unusual incidents spurred 
me into action. 

Those of you who know industrial New York 
understand how the vast army of commuters is 
rushed to the city each day and rushed home again 
at night. From New Jersey alone a crowd of men 
and women larger by far than the entire population 
of the State of Vermont is carried to the banks of 
the Hudson from a territory sixty miles in diameter. 

9 


10 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


Once at the river bank there are two ways by which 
these commuters may reach the city. They may 
float over in the great ferryboats, or they may dive 
under the river in rapid trains driven through a 
tube far below the water. This submarine travel is 
the quicker and more popular way, and during the 
rush hours the great tunnel makes one think of a 
mighty tube of vaseline or tooth paste with a giant 
hand squeezing a thick stream of humanity out of 
the end. 

I reach the Hudson over the Erie Railroad. At 
this point the underground tube makes a wide curve 
inland, and in order to get to the trains we must 
walk through a long concrete cave far underground. 
The other morning several trains arrived at the 
Erie station together, and their passengers were all 
dumped into this cave like grain poured into a long 
sack. There was a solid mass of humanity slowly 
making its w^ay to the end. The city worker 
naturally adapts himself to a crowd. He at once 
becomes an organized part of it. Take a thousand 
countrymen, each from the wide elbow room of his 
farm, and throw them together in a mass and they 
would trample each other in a panic. The city 
crowd, as long as it can be kept good-natured, will 
march on in orderly fashion; but let it once be over¬ 
come by fear, and it will be more uncontrolled than 
the throngs of countrymen. 

This cave is brilliantly lighted, and we were mov- 


TERRORS THAT ARE IMAGINARY 


II 


ing on in orderly procession, without thought of 
danger. We would move forward perhaps 50 feet 
and then halt for a moment—to move ahead once 
more. During one of these halts I looked about me, 
At my right was a group of giggling girls; at my 
left a white-faced, nervous man; behind, a lame man, 
and in front two great giants in blouse and overalls. 
I w r as close by the change booth. A slight, pale- 
faced young woman sat within; the piles of money 
in front of her. A husky, rough-looking man was 
offering a bill to be changed. I saw it all, and as 
I looked, in an instant the lights flashed out and 
left us in inky darkness. 

I have been left in dark, lonely places where I 
groped about without touching a human being, but 
it was far more terrifying to stand in that closely 
packed crowd and to realize what would happen 
in case of a panic. I reached out my hand and 
could touch a dozen people, but I could hear no 
sound. Suppose these silly girls were to scream; 
suppose this man at my elbow were to yell “Fire!” 
as fools have often done in such crowds. Suppose 
that man at the booth reached in, strangled the girl 
and swept the money out. At any of these possible 
alarms that orderly crowd in the dark might change 
to a wild mob, smashing and trampling its way back 
to the entrance, as uncontrollable as the crazy herds 
of cattle I had seen in Western stampedes. The 
deaf man thinks quickly at such times, and in the 


12 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


black silence dangers are magnified. The deaf are 
usually peculiar in their mental make-up; most of 
them have developed the faculty of intuition into a 
sense, and they can quickly grasp many situations 
which the average man would hardly imagine. 

But there was no scream or call of alarm. After 
what seemed to me half an hour of intense living 
the lights flashed back and the big clock at the end 
of the cave, solemnly ticking the time away, showed 
us that we had been less than 50 seconds in darkness. 
With a good-natured laugh the crowd moved on. 
Those girls had had no thought of screaming. They 
were more interested in the group of young men 
behind them. That nervous man, whom I had 
thought trembling with fright, had been laughing 
at the joke. The rough-looking man, whom my fancy 
had painted as a possible murderer and thief, had 
been standing before that money like a faithful dog 
on guard. There had been danger of a panic, and 
I had sensed it, but most of my companions had 
thought of nothing except the joke of being held up 
for a moment. They were happier for their lack of 
imagination. 

At home I started to tell our people about it. 
The baby sat on my knee. She had my knife in her 
hand, paring an apple. Mother sat by the table 
sewing, and the children were scattered about the 
room. Suddenly the lights snapped out. I put up 
my hand just in time to catch the knife as the baby 


TERRORS THAT ARE IMAGINARY 


13 


swung her arm at my face. And there we sat, wait¬ 
ing for the lights to return. There was no fear, for 
we knew each other. There was faith in that dark¬ 
ness; there could be no panic. I could hear no 
sound, yet the baby curled up close to me and all 
was well. Darkness is the worst handicap for the 
deaf. Give them light and they can generally man¬ 
age; but, in the dark, without sound, they are help¬ 
less, and unless they are blessed with strong faith 
and philosophy, imagination comes and prints a 
series of terror pictures for them which you with 
your dependable hearing can hardly realize. 

These incidents gave me my start by bringing to 
my mind the story of John Harlow, curiously 
typical of the imaginary terrors of the deaf and the 
folly of giving way to them. John Harlow was a 
New England man. He had all the imagination 
and all the narrow prejudice of his class; he had 
never traveled west of his own corner of the nation, 
and he was deaf. The man who carries this combi¬ 
nation of qualities about with him is booked for 
trouble whenever he gets out among new types of 
people. Part of the Harlow property was invested 
in land lying in the mountains of Eastern Kentucky, 
and it became necessary for John to go there, to 
look up titles and investigate agents. 

About all the average New Englander of that day 
knew of that mountain country was that it seemed 
to be the stage on which bloody family feuds were 
fought out. The Atlantic Monthly had printed 


14 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


stories by Charles Egbert Craddock, and they were 
accepted as true pictures of mountain life. John 
Harlow should have known that the New Englanders 
and the mountaineers are alike the purest in real 
American blood, and that they must have many 
traits in common; but he went South with the firm 
conviction that life in the mountains must be one 
long tragedy of ambuscades and murders. 

When a deaf man gets such ideas in mind, imagi¬ 
nation prints them in red ink, because the deaf must 
brood over their fears and troubles. They cannot 
lighten the mind with music or aimless conversa¬ 
tion. So when Harlow left the train at a little 
mountain hamlet he was not surprised to find his 
agent a tall, solemn-eyed man, with a long gray 
beard; a typical leader in the family feud, as the 
Boston man had pictured it. Harlow mounted the 
buckboard beside this silent mountaineer, and they 
drove off into the mountains just as the dusky 
shadows were beginning to creep down into the little 
nooks and valleys. As soon as this man found that 
John was deaf he drove on in silence, glancing at 
his companion now and then with that kindly awe 
with which simple people generally regard the deaf. 

It was quite dark when they reached a small 
"cove” or opening in which stood a large house, with 
the usual farm buildings around it; the forest crept 
close to the barn at one point. It struck John that 
the buildings were arranged in the form of a fort, 


TERRORS THAT ARE IMAGINARY 


15 


but what a chance had been left for the enemy to 
creep up through the woods and suddenly fall upon 
them! After supper John stood at the window 
watching the moon lift itself over the mountain and 
go climbing up the sky. There came to his mind the 
description of just such a moonrise, from one of 
Craddock’s stories, where a group of mountaineers 
came creeping over the hill to fall upon the home of 
their enemy. As he stood there he became aware 
that the whole family was making preparations for 
what seemed to him like defense. The women came 
and pulled down the curtains, and one of the boys 
went out and closed the heavy shutters. His host 
came and tried to explain, but Harlow was nervous, 
and it is hard to make the deaf hear at such times. 
All that he could catch were scattered words or 
parts of sentences. “We are waiting for them.” 
‘‘They will be here by nine o’clock. “There is a 
pistol for you.” “They have done us great damage.” 
“We must kill them tonight.” 

Then the lights were put out, and even the great 
fire in the fireplace was dimmed; a rug was thrown 
over the crack under the door, and they all sat there 
—waiting. John Harlow, the deaf man, will never 
forget that scene. The little splinter of light from 
the fire revealed the stern old man and his three 
sons waiting, gun in hand, and the women sitting by 
the table, knitting mechanically in the dimness—all 
listening for the coming of the enemy. By the door 


l6 ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 

lay two large dogs, alert and watchful. And Har¬ 
low, pulled from a comfortable place in Boston and 
suddenly made a part of this desperate family quar¬ 
rel, did not even know what it was all about. He 
started twice to demand an explanation in the loud, 
harsh tones of the deaf, but the older man quickly 
waved him to silence. 

How long they sat in that dim light Harlow can¬ 
not tell. He never thought to look at his watch. 
Suddenly the dogs lying by the door started up with 
low growls and bristling hair. 

“Here they are,” said the old man; “now get 
ready.” 

He thrust a pistol into John’s hand and took him 
by the arm as the boys silently opened the door and 
passed out with the dogs. John found himself fol¬ 
lowing. In the moonlight they crept along the shad¬ 
ow of the buildings out to the point where the woods 
crawled in almost to the barn. There the old man 
crept off to one side. For the moment the moon was 
obscured by a passing cloud. Then its light burst 
upon them, and John from his hiding place dis¬ 
tinctly saw three forms crawling slowly across the 
grassy field to the back of the barn. In the clear 
moonlight he could distinguish three white faces, 
peering through the deep grass. They would move 
slowly forward a few feet, and then halt, apparently 
to listen. The deaf man in this strange, lonely place, 
thought he saw three desperate men making their 


TERRORS THAT ARE IMAGINARY 


1 7 


way to the barn buildings. This very thing bad been 
described in one of the stories be bad read; three 
mountaineers bad crawled slowly through the grass 
to set fire to the barn. And it came to John’s mind 
that these three white-faced fiends were creeping 
up to burn down this home and then shoot down its 
occupants by the light from the burning! The near¬ 
est crawler came slowly to within two rods of John 
and raised his head to look about him. As viewed 
in the moonlight it seemed a hideous face, hardly 
human in its aspect. 

John Harlow was a man of peace, and he had been 
cursing himself for having been brought into this 
neighborhood quarrel. It was none of his business, 
he told himself, but the sight of this cowardly wretch 
crawling up like a snake to fire the buildings was 
too much for Boston reserve, and John raised his 
pistol, took aim at that hateful white face and pulled 
the trigger. The figure seemed to throw itself in the 
air at the shot, and then it lay quiet, the ghastly 
face still in the moonlight. 

As John fired there came a sharp volley from 
the other buildings, and the two other shapes lay 
still. A cloud passed over the moon, and through 
the darkness, feeling himself a murderer, John found 
his way back to the house, where the women were 
waiting with eager faces. They lighted the lamps 
once more and the men came tramping back, to hang 
their guns on the wall. They were all in great 


1 8 ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 

spirits, and the old man came to John’s chair and 
with much shouting and waving his hands, made the 
deaf man understand. 

“You made a great shot. Got him right between 
the eyes. We got them all laid out on the grass— 
come out and see them.” 

But John did not want to see these dead men! He 
was a murderer. He had killed a man, perhaps an 
innocent stranger wiio had never done him wrong. 
It w r as frightful, but even the women insisted that 
he come, so with his eyes shut John permitted him¬ 
self to be drawn out to the hateful spot where those 
dead bodies were lying. 

“There’s the one you got!” roared a voice in his 
ear. 

“You must be a dead shot—look at him; see how 
white he is!” 

And Harlow opened his eyes, expecting to see a 
picture which could never be erased from memory. 
There were the dead bodies on the grass before him 
in the lantern light. There were three big skunks 
with more than the usual amount of white about 
their faces and backs! 

Harlow gazed at them, and his paralyzed mind 
slowly came back to normal working order. And 
then the light came. He had not taken part in any 
family feud. No one had tried to kill him. The 
people of that section were as kindly neighbors as 
any he had ever had in Boston. For some weeks the 


TERRORS THAT ARE IMAGINARY 


19 


skunks had been stealing chickens, and the family 
had organized this successful defense. It was not 
the white face of a man that John had seen in the 
tangled grass, but the white head and back of a 
skunk. He was not a murderer—he was only a 
skunk-killer! 

Most deaf men go through these “adventures in 
silence.” Many of them are not particularly 
thrilling, but they are sometimes exciting enough to 
let the imagination run away with us. In what 
follows I shall try to make it clear that most of our 
fears are imaginary—thin ghosts, stuffed lions, 
scarecrows (or skunks!) which stand beside the road 
to frighten us. For the deaf should know from 
experience that the only safety in life is to go on, 
no matter what dangers croakers or cowards may 
predict just around the curve. 


CHAPTER Jl. 


On the Road to Silence 

The Nature of the Journey to the Silent Country—Sub¬ 
stitutes for Perfect Silence—Sounds of Nature Compan¬ 
ionable—The Direct Attack—“Just As I am”—Compensa¬ 
tion in Idealized Memories—“Cut Out the Bitterness”— 
Reasons for Writing the Book—A Matter of Point of 
View, Concerning John Armstrong’s Possessions. 

I think life has given me a certificate which qual¬ 
ifies me to act as guide and interpreter on the jour¬ 
ney to the Silent Land. For forty years I have been 
traveling along the road to silence. I have seen 
some unfortunate people who were suddenly de¬ 
prived of their hearing, as it seemed without warn¬ 
ing. Fate did not give them even a chance to pre¬ 
pare for the death of sound. It was as if some cruel 
hand had suddenly dragged them into a prison, a 
form of living death through which the poor bewil¬ 
dered wretches must wander aimlessly until they 
could in some feeble way adjust themselves to the 
new conditions which we shall find in the world of 
silence. Happily my journey was not made in that 
way. I have wandered slowly and gently along the 
road, each year coming a little nearer to silence, 
yet working on so easily and unobtrusively that the 


20 


ON THE ROAD TO SILENCE 


21 


way has not seemed hard and rough. I know every 
step of the road, and I can point out the landmarks 
as we pass along. You may be compelled to travel 
over the same route alone some day. Perhaps your 
feet are upon it even now, unknown to you. Take 
my advice and notice the milestones as you pass 
them. 

Let’s not hurry. Let our journey be like one of 
those happy family wanderings in the old farm 
days, long before the age of gasoline. On a Sunday 
afternoon w T e would all start walking, on past the 
back of the farm. Father, mother and the baby, all 
would go. We could stop to drink from the spring, 
to rest under the pines, to stand on the hill looking 
off over the valleys. The beauty of the walk was 
that time was no object; our destination was no¬ 
where in particular, and we always reached it. No 
one hears of those family trips in these days. We 
“go” now. The family, smaller than of old, will 
crowd into a car and go rushing about the country 
in an effort to cover as many miles as possible, and 
to do as little sight-seeing as may be during the rush. 
Now, we shall not hurry, and there will be no great 
objection to our leaving the road now and then to 
gather flowers or bright stones, or to watch a bird 
or a squirrel. We shall need all the pleasant mem¬ 
ories we can think of when we arrive. 

Very likely you have before now entered into a 
“solitude where none intrude,” and have thought 


22 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


yourself entirely alone in the silence. But you had 
not reached the real end of the road. You missed 
some of the familiar sounds of your everyday life, 
but there were substitutes. There was always the 
low growl of the ocean, the murmur of the wind 
among the trees, the cheerful ripple of the brook, 
the song of the birds, or some of the many sweet 
sounds of nature. It was not the silence which we 
know, nor were the voices which came to you harsh 
or distorted. They were clear and true, even though 
they were strange to you. 

I did not realize how largely the habits of our life 
are bound up in sound until some years ago we 
hired a city woman to come and work in our farm¬ 
house. We live in a lonely place. This woman spent 
one night with us. In the morning she came with 
terror in her eyes and begged to be taken back to 
New York. 

“It’s so still here; I can’t sleep!” 

It was true. Her ears had become so accustomed 
to the harsh noises of the city that every nerve and 
faculty had been tuned to them. The quiet of the 
country was as irksome to her as the constant city 
noises are annoying to the countryman, just from 
his silent hills. Perhaps you have awakened sud¬ 
denly in the night in some quiet country place, let 
us say in the loneliness of Winter in the hill country. 
You looked from the window across the glittering 
snow to the dark pines which seemed to prison the 


ON THE ROAD TO SILENCE 


23 


farm and house. You fancied that you had finally 
reached the world of silence, and you were seized by 
a nameless terror as you imagined what would hap¬ 
pen to you if sight were suddenly withdrawn. Then 
you heard the timbers of the house creak with the 
cold, the friendly wind sighed through the trees and 
around the corner of the house. There came faint 
chords of weird music as from an seolian harp when 
it passed over some wire fence. Or perhaps there 
came to you the faint step of some prowling animal. 
Then the terror vanished before these sounds of the 
night. For this is not the world which I ask you to 
enter with me. We are bound for the world of the 
deaf. I tell you in advance that it is a dull, drab 
world, without music or pleasant conversation, into 
which none of the natural tones of the human voice 
or the multitudinous sounds of nature can come. 
You must leave them all behind, and you will never 
realize how much they have meant to you until they 

1 

are out of your reach. Could you readjust your life 
for a new adventure in this strange world? 

The deaf man must carry this world of silence 
about with him always, and it leads him into strange 
performances. I know a deaf man who went to a 
church service. He could hear nothing of the ser¬ 
mon, but he felt something of the glory of worship, 
and when the congregation stood up to sing my deaf 
friend felt that here was where he could help. 

“Just as I am, without one plea,” announced the 


24 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


preacher, and the deaf man’s wife found the place in 
the hymn book. He sang along w T ith the rest and 
thoroughly enjoyed it. However, one of the penal¬ 
ties of the Silent Country is that its inhabitants can 
rarely keep in step with the crowd. My friend did 
not realize that at the end of each verse the organist 
was expected to play a short interlude before the 
next verse started. There has never seemed to me 
to be any reason for these ornamental musical flour¬ 
ishes ; they merely keep us from getting on with our 
singing. 

The deaf man knew nothing of all this. He was 
there to finish the singing of that hymn. It is a 
habit of the deaf to go straight to the end, since there 
is no reason why they should stop to listen. So he 
started in on the second verse as all the rest were 
marking time through that useless interlude, and 
he sang a solo: 

“Just as I am, and waiting not!” 

He sang with all his power, he was in good voice 
and his heart was full of the glory of the service. 
He was never a singer at best, and the voice of a deaf 
person is never musical. This hard, metallic voice 
cut into that interlude much like the snarl of a buzz 
saw. His wife tried to stop him, but he could not 
quite get the idea, and he sang on. It is rather a 
curious commentary on the slavery to habit which 
most intelligent human beings willingly assume that 
this one earnest man, just as little out of step, nearly 


ON THE ROAD TO SILENCE 


25 


destroyed the inspiration of that church service. 
The unconscious solo would have taken all the wor¬ 
ship from the hearts of that congregation had it not 
been for the quick-witted organist. 

Some human beings have risen to the mental 
capacity of animals in understanding and conveying 
a form of unspoken language. It may be “instinct,” 
“intuition,” or what you will, but in some way they 
are able to convey their meaning without words. I 
have found many such people in the world of silence. 
The organist possessed this power. Before the deaf 
man had sung five words she had stopped playing 
her interlude, had caught the time of what he was 
singing, and was signaling the choir to join her. By 
the time they reached the end of the second line at 
“one dark spot” the entire congregation was singing 
as though nothing had happened. The minister, too, 
sensed the situation, for at the end of the verse, be¬ 
fore the deaf man could make another start, he said: 

“Let us pray.” And the incident was happily 
closed. 

As I look about me in the world of silence and see 
some of the sad blunders of my fellows, I feel that 
in their poor way they illustrate something of the 
life tragedy which often engulfs the reformer. The 
deaf man does not know or has forgotten that those 
who are blessed with good hearing do not and can¬ 
not go straight to the mark. Much of their time 
is wasted on useless “interludes” or ornamental 


26 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


flourishes which mean nothing in work or worship. 
This man at the church, while his heart was full, 
could only think of getting that hymn through, ear¬ 
nestly, lovingly, and without loss of time. He may 
have had more true worship in his heart than any 
other member of the congregation, but he dropped 
just a little out of form, and he quickly became a 
ridiculous nuisance. The truth is, if you did but 
know it, that some of your clumsy efforts to keep 
step with so-called fashionable people make you far 
more ridiculous than those of us who fall out of 
step. Nature never intended your big feet for 
dancing, but, because others dance, you must try it. 

Your reformer broods over his mission until it 
becomes a part of his life, a habit which he cannot 
break. He reaches a position where he cannot com¬ 
promise, side-step or wait patiently. He goes ahead 
and never waits for “interludes,” which most of us 
must put in between efforts at “reform.” The rest of 
the world cannot follow him. He becomes a “crank,” 
a “nut,” or an “old stick,” because he cannot stop 
with the crowd and play with the theory of reform, 
but must push on with all his soul. It seems to us 
who look out upon the aimless procession moving 
before us that an average man feels that he cannot 
“succeed” unless he stops at command and plays the 
petty games of society; he has sold himself into the 
slavery of habit and fashion, though he knows how 
poor and trivial they may be. This is bad enough, but 


ON THE ROAD TO SILENCE 


27 


it is worse to see scores of people fastening the hand¬ 
cuffs on their children. Now and then the organist 
has visions which show her what to do, and she 
swings the great congregation to the deaf man’s 
lead. Unhappily there are few such organists. 

It is strange,’indeed, when you come to consider 
it, that two worlds, separated only by sound, lie side 
by side and yet so far apart. You cannot under¬ 
stand our life, and perhaps at times you shudder at 
the thought of how narrow our lives have been made. 
We who have known sound and lost it have learned 
to find substitutes, and we often wonder that you 
narrow your own lives by making such trivial and 
ignoble use of sound as we see you doing. Fate has 
narrowed our lives, and we have been forced to 
broaden them by seeking the larger thoughts. You, 
it often seems to us, straiten your own lives by dwell¬ 
ing with the smaller things of existence. 

The deaf have one advantage at least. They have 
explored the pleasant roads and the dark alleys of 
both worlds. If they are of true heart, in doing so 
they have gained at least a glimpse of that other 
dim, mysterious country which lies hidden beyond 
us all. To the blind, the deaf, or to those who carry 
bravely the cross of some deep trouble, there will 
surely come vision and promise which never appear 
to those who are denied the privilege of passing 
through life under the shadow of a great affliction. 
But these visions do not come to those who pass on 


28 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


with downcast eyes, permitting their affliction to 
bear them down. They are reserved for those who 
defy fate and march through the dark places with 
smiling faces and uplifted eyes. 

Someone has said that the deaf man is half dead, 
because he is unable to separate in his life the living 
memory or sound from the deadness of the silence. 

“I must walk softly all my days in the bitterness 
of my soul.” 

That was the old prophet’s dismal view of life, 
and how often have I heard hopeless sufferers, half 
insane with the jangle of head noises, quote that 
passage. 

“Cut out the bitterness, and I’ll walk softly with 
you,” was the comment of one brave soul who would 
not subscribe to the whole doctrine. I have had two 
deaf men quote that and tell me that their condition 
reminded them of what they had read of prison life 
in the Russian mines. Formerly, in some of these 
mines, men were chained together at their work be¬ 
low ground. Sometimes, when one member of the 
hideous partnership died, the survivor did not have 
his chains removed for days! One of my friends 
told me that he felt as though his life was passed 
dragging about wherever he went the dead body of 
sound, and what it had meant to his former life. 
Unless he could keep his mind fully occupied there 
would rise up before him the dim picture of the pris¬ 
oner dragging his dead partner through the horrors 


ON THE ROAD TO SILENCE 


29 


of their underground prison. The other man who 
made the comparison had a happier view of life. He 
told me that he had read all he could find on the 
subject, and that when these men were released 
from their hateful prison and brought up into the 
sunlight, they seemed to know much about the great 
mystery into which we all must enter. So he felt 
that he was not carrying the dead around with him, 
but rather the living, for the spirit of the old life, 
the best of it in memory and inspiration, remained 
with him. So we deaf are like you of the sound- 
world in that some of us sink under our afflictions, 
while to others of us they are stepping-stones. 

I have come to think that of all the human facul¬ 
ties, sound is the most closely associated with life. 
The blind man may say that light means more than 
sound; I do not know how the question can be fairly 
argued, but I think in most cases deafness removes 
us further from the real joy of living. You will no¬ 
tice that the blind are usually more cheerful than 
the deaf. But at any rate, all the seriously afflicted 
have lost something of life and are not on terms of 
full equality with those who are normal. Their 
compensations must come largely from another 
world. 

Most people pass through life associating only 
with the living, and thus give but little thought to 
any world beside their own. The great majority of 
the people to whom I have talked about the other 


30 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


life are Christians, more or less interested in church 
or charitable work, yet they have no conception of 
what lies beyond. Many of them dimly imagine a 
dark valley or a black hole in the wall through 
which they will grope their way, hopeful that at 
some corner they may come upon the light. The 
law of compensation must give those of us who have 
lost an essential of human life a greater insight into 
that other shadowy existence. For us who have en¬ 
tered the silence there must somewhere be substi¬ 
tutes for music and for the charm of the human 
voice. Most of the deaf who formerly heard carry 
with them memories of music or kindly words, leg¬ 
acies from the world of sound. These are treasured 
in the brain, and as the years go by they become 
more and more ideal. Just as the chemist may by 
continued analysis find new treasures in substances 
which others have discarded, the man whose ears 
are sealed may find new beauties in an old song, or in 
some word lightly spoken, which you in your wild 
riot of sound have never discovered. And perhaps 
out of this long-continued analysis there may come 
fragments of a new language, a vision which may 
give one a closer view or a keener knowledge of 
worlds beyond. Who knows? Again, one may not 
only add the beauty of brightness to the past, but 
one may, if he will, summon the very imps of dark¬ 
ness out of the shadows for their hateful work of 
destroying faith and hope in the human heart. The 


ON THE ROAD TO SILENCE 


31 


Kingdom of Heaven or the prison of hell will be 
built as one may decide—and his tool is the brain. 

“For as a man thinketh in his heart, so is he!” 

It is my conviction that this proverb was written 
by a deaf man, who had thoroughly explored the 
world of silence! 

While the inhabitants of every locality are usu¬ 
ally anxious to increase their population, I am very 
frank to say that some of the recruits wished upon 
us are not a full credit to our community. The 
world in which we must live is naturally gloomy, 
where canned sunshine must be used about as 
canned fruit is carried into the northern snows. It 
is no help to have our ranks filled with discontented, 
unhappy beings who spend the years which might be 
made the best of their lives in bemoaning their fate 
and reminding the rest of us of our affliction. What 
we are trying to do is to forget it as far as we can. 
The deaf man does not want the world’s pity. That 
is the most distasteful thing you can hand him, even 
though it be wrapped in gold. For the expressed 
pity of our friends only leads to self-pity, and 
that, sooner or later, will pit the face of the soul 
like a case of moral smallpox. The most depressing 
thing I have to encounter is the well-meant pity of 
friends and acquaintances. I know from their faces 
that they are shuddering at the thought of my 
affliction, and I see them discussing it, as they look 
at me! Why can they not stop cultivating my 



32 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


trouble? All we ask is a fair chance to make a self- 
respecting living and to be treated as human beings. 
This compassion makes me feel that I am being 
analyzed and separated like an anatomical speci¬ 
men; there will come to me out of the distant past 
of sound the bitter words of a great actor, who said 
as Shylock: 

“I am a Jew. Hath not a Jew eyes? Hath not a 
Jew hands, organs, dimensions, senses, affections, 
passions ?” 

I was brought up among deaf people. They seemed 
rather amusing to me, and I could not imagine any 
condition which could put me in their place. I now 
see that I should have profited by a study of their 
life and habits. I could have been better prepared 
to live the life of a prisoner in the silent world. 
Would I have struggled for greater power and 
wealth? No, for they are not, after all, greater 
essentials here than in your world. Were I to go 
over the road again, I should fill my mind alid soul 
with music, and should strive with every possible 
sacrifice to fill out my life with enduring friend¬ 
ships, the kind that come with youth. It seems to be 
practically impossible for the deaf man to gain that 
friendship which is stronger than any other human 
tie. My aurist once told me that at least sixty per 
cent of the people we meet in every-day life have lost 
part of their hearing. They cannot be called deaf, 
but the hearing is imperfect and deafness is pro- 


ON THE ROAD TO SILENCE 


33 


gressive. Many of you who read this may be slowly 
traveling toward our world, without really knowing 
it. There are in the country today about sixty 
thousand deaf and dumb persons. If we include 
these, my estimate is that there are at least half a 
million persons who have little or no hearing, while 
over one million are obliged to use some kind of a 
device for the ears. So we may safely claim that our 
world is likely to become more thickly settled in 
the future, and we may well prepare to number 
the streets and put up signboards. 

And I will admit another reason for telling you 
about this quiet country. It concerns our own peo¬ 
ple, for whom I speak. I would gladly do what I 
can to make life easier for the deaf. Their lot is 
usually made harder through the failure of others to 
understand the affliction, and to realize what it 
means to live in the silence. In my own case I can 
make no complaint. I am confident that society has 
treated me better than I deserve, given me more 
than I have returned. I have been blessed with 
family and friends who have made my affliction far 
easier than it might have been. I realize that it is 
not easy for the ordinary person to be patient and 
fair w T ith the deaf. We may so easily become nui¬ 
sances. I presume that there is no harder test of a 
woman’s character and ability than for her to serve 
as the wife of a deaf man, to endure his moods and 
oddities and suspicions with gentleness and patience 


34 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


and loving help. A woman may well hesitate to 
enter such a life unless the man is of very superior 
character. 

Now and then I meet deaf people who complain 
bitterly at the treatment which society metes out to 
them. In most cases I think they are wrong, for we 
must all admit squarely the foundation fact of our 
affliction, which is that we may very easily become 
a trouble and a nuisance socially. We represent 
perhaps two per cent of the nation’s population, 
and we can hardly expect the other ninety-eight per 
cent always to understand us. I have had people 
move away from me as though they expected me to 
bite them. Some sensitive souls might feel that they 
were thus associated with mad dogs, but it is better 
to see the humor of it. For my part, I have come to 
realize that I am barred from terms of social equal¬ 
ity with those Avho live in the kingdom of sound. I 
have come to be prepared for a certain amount of 
impatience and annoyance. I am often myself im¬ 
patient with those dull souls who depend so en¬ 
tirely upon their ears that they have failed to culti¬ 
vate the instinct or the intuition which enables us 
to grasp a situation at a glance. But I do ask for 
our people a fair hearing, if I may put it that way. 
While we are deprived of many of your opportuni¬ 
ties and possibilities, we think we have developed 
something which you lack, perhaps unconsciously. 


ON THE ROAD TO SILENCE 35 

We can turn our experience over to you if you will 
be patient. 

Do not fear that I shall corner you to make you 
listen to a tale of woe. The truth is that I often 
feel, in all sincerity, exceedingly sorry for you poor 
unfortunates who must listen to all the small talk 
and the skim-milk of conversation. 

“I saw a smith stand with his hammer—thus, 

The whilst his iron did on the anvil cool, 

With open mouth swallowing a tailor’s news!” 

It is so long since I have been able to chatter and 
play with words that I forget what people talk 
about. Some of them at least seem to have talked 
their tongues loose from their brains. I often ask 
intelligent people after this chatter what it was all 
about, and whether their brains were really work¬ 
ing as they babbled on. Not one in ten can give any 
good reason for the conversation or remember twen¬ 
ty words of it. Do you wonder that we of the 
silence, seeing this waste of words, pick up our 
strong and enduring book and wander away with 
the great undying characters of history, rather 
thankful that we are not as other men, condemned 
to waste good time on such trivial exercise of ears 
and tongues? 

That is the way we like to think about it, but 
there is a worm in this philosophy after all. I have 


36 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


reasoned tilings out in this way fifty times; the 
logic seems perfect, and yet my mind works back 
from my book to the story of John Armstrong and 
his New England farm. 

John was a seedling, rooted in one of those Ver¬ 
mont hill farms. The Psalmist tells of a man who 
is like “a tree planted by the rivers of water”; such 
a tree puts its roots down until it becomes well- 
nigh impossible to pull them out of the earth. There 
had been a mortgage howling at the Armstrong door 
for generations. Not much beside family pride can 
be grown on these hillsides, and John would have 
spent his life cultivating it to the end, if his lungs 
hadn’t given out. The country doctor put it to him 
straight; it was stay on the hills and die, or go to 
the Western desert and probably live. In some way 
the love of life proved strongest. John bequeathed 
his share of the family pride to brother Henry and 
went to Arizona. There he lost the use of one lung, 
but filled his pockets with money. He secured a 
great tract of desert land, and one day the engineers 
turned the course of a mountain stream and spread 
it over John’s land. At home in Vermont the little 
streams tumbled down hill, played with a few mill 
wheels, gave drink to a few cows and sheep, and 
played on until they reached the river, to be finally 
lost in the ocean. In Arizona the river caused the 
desert to bloom with Alfalfa, and wheat, and or¬ 
chards, thus turning the sand to gold. 


ON THE ROAD TO SILENCE 


37 


And one day John stood on the mountain with 
his friends and looked over the glowing country, all 
his—wealth uncounted. All his! Worth an entire 
county of Vermont, so his friends told him. 

“You should be a happy man,” they said, “with 
all that wealth and power taken from the sand. A 
happy man—what more can you ask ?” 

“I know it,” said John. “I know it—and yet, in 
spite of it all, right face to face with all this wealth, 
Fd give the whole darned country for just one week 
in that Vermont pasture in June!” 

And so, unmolested in my world of silence, free 
from chatter and small talk, able to concentrate my 
mind on strong books, I look across to the idle gos- 
sippers and know just how John Armstrong felt. 
I would give up all this restful calm if I could only 
hear my boy play his violin, if I could only hear lit¬ 
tle Hose when she comes to say good-night, if I could 
only hear that bird which they say is singing to her 
young in yonder tree. 


CHAPTER III. 


Head Noises and Subjective Audition. 

Head Noises—The Quality Probably Depends on the Mem¬ 
ory of Sounds Heard in Youth—The Sea and the Church 
Bells—“Voices” and Subjective Audition—Insanity and 
the Unseen—The Rich Dream Life of the Deaf. 

Deafness is not even complete silence, for we must 
frequently listen to head noises, which vary from 
gentle whispering to wild roars or hideous bellow¬ 
ing. There is little other physical discomfort 
usually, though some exceptional cases are asso¬ 
ciated with headache or neuralgia. There is, how¬ 
ever, an annoying pressure upon the ears, which is 
greatly increased by excitement, depression or ex¬ 
treme fatigue. Unseen hands appear to be pressing 
in at either side of the head. The actual noises are 
peculiar to the individual in both quantity and qual¬ 
ity; there are cases of the “boiler-maker’s disease,” 
where the head is filled with a hammering which 
keeps time with the pulse. I have known people to 
be amazed at the “uncontrolled fury” of the deaf 
when their anger is fully aroused—perhaps by some¬ 
thing which seems trivial enough. They do not 
realize how a sudden quickening of the heart action 

38 


HEAD NOISES AND SUBJECTIVE AUDITION 39 

may start a great army of furies to shouting and 
smashing in the deaf man’s brain! 

Again, the roaring and the pounding will start 
without warning, and then as suddenly fade to a 
dim murmur. It appears to diminish when the vic¬ 
tim can concentrate his mind upon some cheerful 
subject, so I take it to be more of a mental or ner¬ 
vous disorder—not essentially physical. Many times 
I have observed that these noises become more vio¬ 
lent and malignant whenever the mind is led into 
melancholy channels. They appear to be modified 
and softened in dreams, so I am thankful that I 
have been able to train myself into the ability to 
lie down and sleep when the clamor becomes unen¬ 
durable. I meet people who pride themselves on 
their ability to go without sleep, and I shudder to 
think of their fate should they ever be marooned in 
the silence, since they appear to regard extra hours 
of sleep as a form of gross negligence at least! 
These night-owls tell me that they are the “pep” of 
society—its greatest need. I am not so sure of their 
mission. As I see it, the world has already too 
much “pep” for its own good. We need more “salt.” 

You have doubtless noticed deaf people who go 
about with a weary, half-frightened expression, and 
have wondered why they have failed to “brace up” 
and accept their lot with philosophy. You do not 
realize how these discordant sounds and malignant 
voices are driving these deaf people through life as 


40 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


a haunted man is lashed along the avenues of eter¬ 
nal doom. Of course his will frequently becomes 
broken down, and his capacity for consistent and 
continuous labor is practically destroyed. Do you 
know that if you were forced to remain for several 
hours in a roaring factory you would come back to 
your friends showing the same symptoms of voice 
and manner which you notice in the deaf? 

In my own case these noises have not been greatly 
troublesome, since I have persistently refused to 
listen to them. It is not unlikely that they are 
largely imaginary—although you are free to experi¬ 
ment by taking a double dose of quinine, which 
should give you a fair imitation of what many deaf 
people live with. The chief noise trouble that I have 
had is a sort of low roaring or murmuring, at times 
rising to an angry bellow, and then again dying to 
a low muttering. The deaf usually remember com¬ 
mon noises heard in their youth, although I fancy 
that as the years go on our memory of sound 
changes with them. My private demonstration re¬ 
minds me of the old sound of the ocean, pounding 
on the shores of the seaport town in New England 
where I was born. It seems to me now that the 
ocean was never quiet, except at low tide, and even 
then there came a low growl from the bar far out at 
the harbor entrance. I can remember lying awake 
at night as a child, listening to the pounding of the 
surf or the lap of the waves against the wharf. With 


HEAD NOISES AND SUBJECTIVE AUDITION 41 

l gentle east wind there was a low, musical murmur, 
but when the wind rose and worked to the north it 
seemed to me like a giant smashing at the beach, or 
like a magnified version of the Autumn Hails pound¬ 
ing on barn doors far back among the hills. It 
seems to me now that I can hear and distinguish all 
those variations of sound in the noises within my 
head; I have often wondered if such memories ever 
come to those who have perfect hearing. 

Poets and dreamers have enlarged upon the ro¬ 
mantic quality of “the sad sea waves.” I once knew 
a woman who wrote very successful songs about the 
“shining sea,” though she never saw the ocean in 
her life. Those who live in the interior, far from 
the ocean, with never a view of any large body of 
water, are easily led to believe that the sounds of 
the sea are delightful companions. I often wish I 
could share my part of the performance with them! 
I would gladly exchange my constant sound com¬ 
panion for ten minutes of wind among the trees. 
Bryant says: 

“There is society, where none intrude, 

By the deep sea, and music in its roar.” 

True; but Bryant was not deaf. No doubt as a 
child he held a sea shell to his ear and listened to 
its murmuring with delight. But he could lay it 
aside when it became tiresome! One speaks from 


42 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


quite another point of view when incased for life 
within the shell. 1 think I know just how the Apos¬ 
tle John felt when, looking out from every direction 
from his weary island, he saw only the blue, rolling 
water. He wrote as part of his conception of 
heaven: 


“There shall be no more sea!” 

I agree with him fully, and yet I know people 
whose conception of heaven includes Byron’s apos¬ 
trophe to the ocean. How can we all be satisfied? 

Other curious sounds come to us as we sit in the 
silence. Some are interesting, a few are strange or 
delightful. I frequently seem to hear church bells 
gently chiming, just as they did years ago when the 
sound came over the hills of the little country town 
where I was a boy. The sound now seems to start 
far away, dim in the distance; gradually it comes 
nearer, until the tones seem to fall upon the ear 
with full power. They are always musical, never 
discordant; they go as suddenly and as unexpect¬ 
edly as they come. And where do they come from? 
Can it be that dormant brain cells suddenly arouse 
to life and unload their charge of gentle memories? 
Or it may be—but you are not interested in what 
the deaf man comes to think of strange messengers 
who enter the silent world. You would not believe 


HEAD NOISES AND SUBJECTIVE AUDITION 43 

me were I to tell you all we think and feel about 
them. 

When I asked my aurist about this he wanted to 

know if any particular incidents of my childhood 

were connected with the ringing of bells. I could 

remember two. It was the custom, years ago, for 

the sexton of the Unitarian Church to come and 

strike the bell when any member of the community 

died. There was one stroke for each year of their 

age. That was the method of carrying the news. 

The sexton did not pull the rope, but climbed into 

the belfry and pulled the tongue of the bell with a 

string. It was my duty to count the strokes, and 

thus convey the news to my deaf aunt. In that 

community we knew each other so well that this 
•/ 

tolling the age gave us as much about it as one 
would now get over the telephone. And then the 
bell on the Orthodox Church over in the next valley! 
That always rang on Sunday, before our bell did, 
and I heard it softly and musically as the sound 
floated over to us. I had been taught to believe that 
the Orthodox people had a very hard and cruel reli¬ 
gion, and I used to wonder how their bell could 
carry such soft music. When I spoke of this the 
aurist smiled understanding^ and said it fully ex¬ 
plained why these musical sounds now come back 
to my weary brain. 

Actual voices come to us at times. I have had 
words or sentences shouted lustily in my ears. In 


44 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


several eases while sitting alone at night reading 
or writing this conversation of the unseen has 
seemed so clear and natural that I have stopped and 
glanced about the room, or even moved about the 
house, half expecting to find some visitor. As a 
rule the sentences are incoherent, and are not closely 
connected with everyday life; they sometimes refer 
to things which have preyed upon my mind in pre¬ 
vious days. Deaf friends have told me of direct and 
important warnings and suggestions they have re¬ 
ceived in this way, but I have known nothing of the 
sort. It does seem to me, however, that this shout¬ 
ing and incoherent talking usually refers to matters 
which I have deeply considered at times of depres¬ 
sion, fatigue or strong excitement. I consider that, 
as in the case of the bells, it may mean the sudden 
stirring of brain cells which have stored up strongly 
expressed thoughts, and are in some way able to 
give them audible rendition to the deaf. 

My aurist offers an ingenious explanation. He says 
that I can hear my own voice, and undoubtedly it is 
at some times clearer than at others. I may uncon¬ 
sciously “think out loud”; that is, go through the 
interesting performance of talking to myself with¬ 
out knowing that I am doing it. Perhaps if he were 
deaf himself he would not be quite so sure of his 
theory—nothing is so convincing as a fact. I re¬ 
member that at one time my dentist was trying to 
persuade me that I ought to have a plate. 


HEAD NOISES AND SUBJECTIVE AUDITION 45 

“But that is merely your theory,” I said. “You 
tell me that you can make a plate which will enable 
me to eat and talk in a natural manner. How do I 
know? I think a dentist, to be entirely successful, 
should be able to prove such statements from his 
own experience.” 

For answer he gravely took a good-sized plate out 
of his own mouth. I had no idea that he had one! 
I have often wished that some of our skilled aurists 
might graft their theory of head noises upon prac¬ 
tical experience. 

Scientists and psychologists refer to these noises 
as subjective audition. I shall attempt no scientific 
discussion of the matter, as this book is intended to 
be a record of personal or related experience. All 
students of deafness seem to agree that we can hear 
sounds, definite noises and even words that are 
purely subjective. Certainly in some forms of in¬ 
sanity the victims hear voices commanding them to 
do this or that. I have known several persons ap¬ 
parently sane in all other matters who insist that 
unseen friends talk to them and give advice. 

Some years ago I was permitted to make a careful 
study of members of a small religious community 
which was established near my farm. Its members 
were ordinary country people, for the most part of 
rather low mentality and narrow thought, yet with 
a curiously shrewd power of intuition. They were 
fanatics, and among other practices or “self-denials” 


46 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


they refused to eat anything which had to do with 
animal life. Thus they limited their diet to grain, 
vegetables and fruit. One man, who called himself 
“John the Baptist,” found this restriction a rigorous 
punishment, for he “liked to eat up hearty!” He 
wrestled in spirit for weeks, and finally told me that 
he had received an unanswerable argument straight 
from the Lord. In a moment of depression he had 
heard a voice from Heaven saying very distinctly: 

“John, look at that big black horse!” 

“I can see him right now!” 

“Look at him! He is big and strong and can pull 
a plow all alone. Hoes he eat meat? No, he lives 
on grain and hay—the grass of the field! Now if 
that big horse can keep up his strength without meat, 
you can do the same, John!” 

And John fully believed that he had held direct 
conversation with the Lord. No man could shake 
his faith in that. Undoubtedly it was a case of that 
subjective audition similar to what the deaf exper¬ 
ience. John heard the conversation, or at least 
imagined that the words were spoken; they followed 
or grew out of his thought. 

I myself have had enough experience along this 
line to make me very charitable with those who give 
accounts of this sort of thing. It is a question, how¬ 
ever, as to just how much of the unseen one can hear 
and not be considered insane! While some of the 
deaf lack the imagination to carry out this strange 


HEAD NOISES AND SUBJECTIVE AUDITION 47 

experience, others realize that the public draws no 
distinct boundary between “oddity” and insanity, 
and are wary of repeating all the strange messages 
which come to them. I think it is beyond question 
that primitive people, Indians, isolated mountain¬ 
eers or ignorant folk living in lonely places have this 
subjective side of their hearing greatly developed. 
This I believe to be also true of educated thinkers v 
who are largely influenced by imagination. It seems 
perfectly evident to me that some persons of peculiar 
psychic power may really develop abilities unknown 
to those who possess the ordinary five senses. As I 
have stated elsewhere in this book, I predict that 
the study of this strange power is to develop during 
the next century, and that the afflicted are to lead in 
its investigation. 

Speaking of head noises and imaginary voices, I 
have an idea that there are deaf men who took these 
things too seriously and came to think that such 
noises appear to all. This led to a condition which 
made it something of a trial to live with them. They 
have been railroaded off to some “sanitarium” or 
asylum, even though they may be entirely sane. I 
have met deaf men who realize all this, and there¬ 
fore, as they express it, they “will not tell all they 
know.” I am convinced that for this reason much 
that might be valuable to the psychologist is lost to 
the world. 

Another strangely interesting point in this con- 


48 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


nection is that the deaf hear perfectly in dreams. 
Even considering dream psychology, this is to me the 
most curious phenomenon of the condition. In 
dreams I seem to meet my friends just as in waking 
hours, and I hear their conversation, even to a whis¬ 
per. I also hear music, but it is entirely of the old 
style which I heard as a young man, before my hear¬ 
ing failed. Unfortunately (or otherwise) the mod¬ 
ern “jazz” and rag time tunes mean nothing to me; 
I have never heard a note of them. In dreams I hear 
grand operas and songs of the Civil War and the 
following decade; these last are plaintive melodies 
for the most part, for New England, when I was a 
young man, was full of “war orphans,” who largely 
dictated the music of the period. But even in sleep, 
listening as easily as anyone to this old music or to 
the voices of friends, the thought comes to me con¬ 
stantly that I am really deaf, and that all this riot 
of music and conversation is abnormal. The psy¬ 
chological explanation that here is a dream struggle 
between a great desire and the fact which thwarts 
it in real life sounds plausible enough, but the deaf 
man still must ponder on the profound mystery of 
his dream-life. I do not know just how common this 
dream music or sleep conversation may be among 
the deaf. I am told that some deaf people rarely, if 
ever, have this experience, while others tell very re¬ 
markable stories of what comes to them in sleep. It 
must be understood that I am merely giving my own 


IIL^D NOISES AND SUBJECTIVE AUDITION 49 

personal experience, without trying to record the 
general habit of the deaf. 

Physicians relate some curious experiences in this 
line. In one case a deaf and dumb man, utterly in¬ 
capable of hearing when awake, was made to hear 
music and conversation when asleep. On the other 
hand, a deaf man who could hear music and conver¬ 
sation in dreams could not be awakened even by 
loud noises close to his ear. He showed a mechan¬ 
ical response to the vibration by a slight flicker of 
the eyelids, but protested that he heard nothing of 
the racket. In most cases of hysterical deafness 
arising from nervous trouble or shell shock during 
the war the patient seemed to have forgotten how to 
listen. If he could be made to listen intently he 
usually made some gain in hearing. Mind control 
or the use of some hypnotic influence is actually 
helpful in many cases. 

I feel confident that this subjective hearing and 
these strange voices are responsible for the rever¬ 
ence or fear with which the Indians and other igno¬ 
rant people usually regard the deaf. It is not unlikely 
that the famous “voices” which inspired Joan of 
Arc resulted from a form of subjective audition. 
Seers or “mediums” probably have developed this 
quality until it gains for them the respect and awe 
of their constituents; this would account for their 
great influence with primitive peoples. I have even 
had evidence of a remarkable attitude of wonder- 


50 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


ment toward myself on the part of strange people 
among whom I have traveled. 

I take it that all this subjective audition arises 
from thoughts and emotions filed away by memory 
somewhere in the mind. Business men run through 
their dusty files and find letters or documents that 
were put there years ago and forgotten. Here at 
last they are brought to recollection, and the memo¬ 
ries associated with them start a train of ideas 
which may affect the mind like a joyous parade or 
a funeral procession. The deaf, lacking the healing 
or diverting influence of sound, live nearer to this 
subconscious stratum of memories and can more 
easily call them up; in time of worry or great 
fatigue they can more easily come to us. Much of 
the curious foolishness of intoxicated persons re¬ 
sults from this rising of the subconscious. 

I have no doubt that the original deaf man, far 
back in history, when men lived in caves without 
light or fire, was considered a gifted and highly 
favored individual. I think it likely that the voices 
and strange noises which come to us through sub¬ 
jective audition were considered by these primitive 
people as communications from the strange, myste¬ 
rious powers which changed light into darkness, and 
brought cold, hunger and storm. Probably the 
original deaf man was given the warmest corner in 
the cave and the first choice of food, in order to 
propitiate the spirit which communicated with him. 


HEAD NOISES AND SUBJECTIVE AUDITION 51 

The modern deaf man, however, can take little pride 
in the good fortunes of his original representative, 
for he is made aware every day that his fellows no 
longer class him as a necessity in the world’s econ¬ 
omy, unless perchance he is able to lend them money 
or cater to their necessities. 

It has been clearly shown that the play of our 
emotions has a physical influence on the body. The 
working of such emotions as fear, anger or worry 
is destructive; joy or quiet pleasure helps to build 
up rather than to break down. The happier emo¬ 
tions are nearly always influenced or guided by 
sound—music, or gentle tones of the voice. Thus 
we may see how the deaf, deprived of this healing 
or harmonizing influence, except in dreams, may 
easily become fearsome and morbid. Once a woman 
loathed dishwashing with a hatred too bitter for this 
world. She was obliged to do it, and she was able 
to largely overcome her emotion of disgust by play¬ 
ing selections from the operas on the victrola while 
at her work. That music influenced the counter 
emotions of joy and beauty until they overcame the 
loathing. Her hands were in the dishwater, but her 
mind was in glory—and then what did her hands 
matter? We can all remember similar cases where 
music has filled the soul with a great joy and has 
lifted the body out of menial tasks or humiliation. 
But music is not for the deaf; we are shut away 
from it, and can find no substitute. We must 
work out our mental troubles as best we can. 


CHAPTER IV. 


Facing the Hard Situation 

The Beginnings of Deafness—The Cows in the Corn—Re¬ 
adjustments—The “House of the Deaf”—Spirits of the 
Past on Our Side—The Course in Philosophy—The Rev¬ 
erence of the Ignorant Herder—The Slave and the King. 

Every deaf man will tell yon that for months or 
years he was able to convince himself that there was 
no real danger of losing his hearing. Then, sud¬ 
denly made evident by some small happening, Fate 
stood solidly in the road pointing a stern finger— 
and there was no denying the verdict: “You are on 
the road to silence!” How foolish and dangerous 
to fight off the disagreeable thought when most cases 
of deafness could be cured or greatly helped if taken 
in time! It is safe to say that if the first symptoms 
of defective hearing were as uncomfortable as a 
cinder in the eye, or as painful as an ordinary 
stomach-ache, the great majority of cases would be 
remedied before the affliction could lead its victims 
into the silent world. But deafness usually creeps 
in without pain or special 'warning; if it is caused 
by a disease of the inner ear there are probably few 
outward symptoms, and it will not be considered 
serious. Then suddenly it will demonstrate its 

52 


FACING THE HARD SITUATION 


53 


stranglehold upon life, and cannot be shaken off; 
it is like a tiger creeping stealthily through grass 
and brush for a spring upon the careless watcher by 
the campfire. 

I first looked into the dim shadows of the silent 
country one night in Colorado. Our people had 
broken up a piece of ra*< prairie land, ditched water 
to it and planted corn. It was a new crop for the 
locality, but we succeeded in getting a good growth 
for cattle feed. In those days there were few fences, 
except the horizon and the sky, and cattle wandered 
everywhere, so as the corn developed we took turns 
guarding it. One night a small bunch of fat cattle 
on their way to market was herded about a mile 
from our cornfield. Feed was scarce on the range, 
and these steers were hungry. We could see them 
raise their heads and smell the corn. We knew they 
would stampede if they could break aw T ay. I was on 
guard; my duty was to ride my pony up and down 
on the side of the field nearest the herd. 

Those who know the plains which roll away from 
the foothills of Northern Colorado will remember 
the brilliant starlit nights. The dry plains stretch 
away in rolling waves of brown to the east, while to 
the west the mountains lift their snow-caps far up 
into the sparkle of the starlight. It is a land of 
mystery. Any man who has ever lived there has 
felt at times that he would give all he possessed to 
be back there with the shapes that live in the star- 


54 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


light. Great dark shadows slip over the plains. You 
see them slowly moving and you wonder at them. 
How can they shift as they do when there are no 
clouds? That night, far over the prairie, I could 
see the fires which the herders had built; two or 
three horsemen were slowly circling about the 
bunched cattle. 

It seemed entirely safe, and at one corner of the 
field 1 got off the pony and let him feed as I walked 
along the corn. The night was still, and I could 
hear nothing, but suddenly my little horse threw up 
his head, snorted and pulled at his picket pin. I 
fancied he sensed some sneaking coyote, until out of 
a shadow near the field I saw half a dozen black 
forms with white gleaming horns, running for the 
corn. Part of the herd had broken away, and as I 
mounted the snorting pony the sickening thought 
flashed in upon me that I could no longer hear them. 
Before we could turn back the herd forty or fifty 
steers had entered the corn. They went aimlessly, 
smashing and crashing their way through the stalks, 
and with the other riders I went in after them, but 
I could hardly hear them. I remember that in order 
to make sure I held my fingers to my right ear to 
shut out sound. In the shadow of the corn I ran 
directly into a steer! He was tearing his way along, 
but I did not know he was there until my hands 
touched him. Then for the first time I knew whither 
I was bound. Probably there is nothing quite so 


FACING THE HARD SITUATION 55 

chilling to the heart, unless it be the sudden knowl¬ 
edge that some dear friend must soon walk down 
the road with death. 

Deaf people who read this will recall incidents 
connected with the first real discovery of their 
affliction; up to that time they have been able to 
throw the trouble out of mind with more or less con¬ 
fidence. They could argue that it was due to a cold, 
or to some little trouble that would soon adjust 
itself; they were slightly annoyed, but soon forgot 
it. Then—perhaps they cannot keep up with the 
conversation; they seem suddenly to lose the noises 
which are a part of daily normal life. Neither their 
work nor their play can go on without a complete 
readjustment of their methods of communicating 
with others. Suppose society refuses to do more for 
them than they have ever done for the afflicted? 
Many a man has been made to realize how small a 
moral balance he has to draw upon when at last he 
knows that for the rest of his life he must depend 
largely upon the charity or indulgence of those with 
whom he associates. For this is really our condition 
in the silent world. A person of dominating power 
may push through life thinking himself a master, 
but we must live with the humiliation of realizing 
that our friends cannot regard us as normal. It is 
a staggering blow to the man or woman of fixed 
ambition, or of that w r arm personality which de- 


56 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


mauds human sympathy and kindly companionship. 
The old life must be broken up. 

My first thought was to seek “medical advice/’ 
That is what we are always told to do. The air 
about the deaf man is usually vibrant with advice, 
and frequently the less attention he pays to it the 
better off he is. The local doctor in the nearest town 
was an expert with pills, powders and blisters, but 
he went no farther. Like many country doctors of 
that time, he was little more than an expert nurse, 
though if you had told him this he could have shaken 
a diploma in your face. I went to see him one eve¬ 
ning after milking. He had a kerosene lamp with a 
tin reflector with which he illumed my ears; his 
report was that the trouble was caused by wax 
growing on the ear drum. If I would come in by 
daylight he would scrape it off with a small knife. 
There was nothing to be alarmed about; I would 
outgrow it. As a precaution he would advise me to 
blister the ears—or that part of the skull imme¬ 
diately behind them—and- 

“My charge is tivo dollars!” 

Since then several famous aurists have peered 
into my nose and ears; they told me the truth, and 
charged more than this doctor did for his wild 
guess. 

Later I shall describe some of the local treatments 
to which my poor ears have been subjected. It 
would make a volume in itself were I to tell all, and 




FACING THE HARD SITUATION 


57 


it would record the experience of most country peo¬ 
ple who go down the silent road. Frequently the 
city man may obtain expert advice from aurists 
who fully understand that they are dealing with an 
interior nerve or brain disease. Most of us who 
were “brought up” in the country fell into the hands 
of physicians who appeared to think deafness is 
what they call a “mechanical disease,” much like 
the sprain of the knee or wrist. That country doc¬ 
tor saw only the wax on the ear drum, when the 
real trouble was far inside. So we are blistered and 
oiled and irrigated—and the real seat of the trouble 
is not reached. Of course I should have found some 
one competent to treat my case. That is easily said, 
but the great majority of young men in my day were 
without capital, quite incapable of taking advice, 
and they labored under the conviction that any pub¬ 
lic admission of serious disease would be considered 
a weakness that was like a stigma. 

I have been singularly unsuccessful in obtaining 
original impressions from deaf people in trying to 
learn from them just what were their sensations 
when it became evident, past all argument, that they 
were to walk softly through ever-increasing silence. 
It would seem that they rarely have great imagina¬ 
tion ; perhaps silence, and a lack of the stimulant of 
sound, destroys that faculty. Psychology estimates 
that of all the senses hearing has the greatest in¬ 
fluence over the emotions and the morals. I fancy 


58 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


that the violent effort to readjust life habits to a 
new existence bewilders most of us, so that the mind 
is incapable of working in exactly the old way. Ap¬ 
parently many of the deaf fall into a morbid, hope¬ 
lessly despondent frame of mind, which does not 
permit any reasonable and useful research into the 
habits and landmarks which characterize a strange 
country. I know how useless it is to tell the ordi¬ 
nary deaf man that it is a rare privilege to know 
and to study the ideas which special messengers 
bring to us in the silent world. I know that what 
I tell him is true, yet 1 am forced to agree with him 
when he says that he would give it all for the privi¬ 
lege of hearing a hand-organ playing on a street 
corner. Still, it is a part of the game for us to be¬ 
lieve that in many ways the deaf are the favored of 
the Lord. 

As far as my own experience goes, I know that I 
went about for some time in a daze. In spite of the 
verdict of the country doctor I realized that my 
hearing was surely failing, and I remember that I 
began to take stock of my mental and physical as¬ 
sets for the great game of life that was opening up 
before me. When a man does that fairly he will 
realize how industry and skill are changing all lines 
of life. When I was a boy playing ball we always 
put the poorest, most awkward player in right field. 
That was the jumping-off place in baseball. As the 
game is now played right field offers opportunity for 


FACING THE HARD SITUATION 


59 


the best player of tlie nine. After standing off and 
looking at myself fairly I was forced to conclude 
that I was not fitted to enter the silent world with 
any great hope of making more than the most ordi¬ 
nary living there. Try it yourself. Cast up your 
personal account, giving a fair valuation to the 
things you can do really well, and then tell me what 
sort of a living you could make for your family if 
tomorrow you found yourself totally blind or 
totally deaf. Like many young men I had received 
no special training for any life enterprise; I knew 
no trade and had no particular “knack” at tools or 
machinery/ I had attended a country school and 
one term of high school, but had never been taught 
the true foundation principles of any of my sub¬ 
jects. I had read many books without direction or 
good judgment, with no definite end in view. The 
sum total of my life assets seemed to be that I was 
an expert milker and could take care of cattle; the 
, most promising position for me that of a rather 
inferior hired man. Thousands of men have gone 
through life with a poorer outfit, but they have had, 
in addition, the boon of perfect hearing; how great 
an advantage this is no one can know until he must 
face the world without it. 

Every healthy young man looks forward to the 
time when he may build four strong walls about 
his life. These walls are home, wife, a piece of land 
and power. In the flush of youth we feel that if we 


6o 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


build this square and live inside we may laugh at 
adversity and say in our hearts, “The world is 
mine!” But this becomes a troubled dream when 
one comes to understand that he must crawl through 
life crippled—with one great faculty on crutches. 

It is rather curious how at such a time the mind 
grasps at meanings hardly considered before, and 
makes new and rapid applications from things 
which formerly seemed of no consequence. I re¬ 
member picking up at this time a school reader 
which one of the children was studying. My eye 
fell on the old familiar poem—how many of us have 
performed a parrot-like recitation of it in the little 
old schoolhouse! 

“Oh, solitude! where are the charms 
Which sages have seen in thy face? 

Better dwell in the midst of alarms 
Than reign in this horrible place. 

I am out of humanity’s reach, 

I must finish my journey alone; 

Xever hear the sweet music of speech, 

I start at the sound of my own!” 

I had read this many times before without getting 
its full power. Now I saw that I was drifting with 
other deaf men out of reach of the “soft music of 
speech.” Suppose that I were to end my days on a 


FACING THE HARD SITUATION 


6l 


desert island of complete silence! The idea haunted 
me for days, and I thought it out to the end. At 
last it came to me that Kobinson Crusoe and Alex¬ 
ander Selkirk were but examples of brave spirits 
who could not be conquered by ordinary conditions. 
Other men have been marooned or swept ashore 
upon deserted or unknown islands—men of feeble 
will, without stern personal power. They made a 
struggle to hold on to civilization, but finally gave 
up, surrendered to natural forces, and either per¬ 
ished or reverted to barbarism. They, “heirs of all 
the ages,” renounced the progress of their race and 
went back nearer to the brute. Crusoe and Selkirk 
were made of sterner stuff. They were not to be 
beaten; out of the crudest materials they made 
home and companions and retained self-respect and 
much of the sweetness of life. Each made his own 
house in a new world, fashioned it by sheer force of 
will and faith. I made up my mind that I would do 
likewise. I would build my own house in the silent 
world and would make it a house of cheer. 

But who will help the deaf man to build his 
house? Where can he find the material? I meet 
deaf people who complain bitterly because the peo¬ 
ple with whom they work and live do not treat them 
with full understanding and consideration. Let us 
be honest, and remember how little ice ever went 
out of our way to stand by the deaf before our own 
affliction put us out of the social game! No doubt 


62 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


we laughed with the others at the queer blunders of 
deaf people, or let them see our annoyance when 
communication with them became a trouble. The 
chances are that we will receive fairer treatment 
from our associates than we ourselves gave to the 
afflicted in our best days. As for me, I vote the 
world a kindly place; people treat me reasonably. 
They are not cruel, but many of them are busy or 
selfish, and I fully realize that it is no pleasure for 
the average man or woman to attempt communica¬ 
tion with the deaf. I do not blame them for avoid¬ 
ing it. And even when they use us well, from the 
very nature of the situation which separates us they 
can help but little in the building of these isolated 
houses of the silent world. 

But I have lived to learn a strange thing. The 
silent world is peopled with the ghosts and shadows 
of men and women who have lived in other ages. 
Somehow they seem to feel that they would like to 
relive their lives, and repeat their message to 
humanity; but only the blind, the deaf and those 
otherwise afflicted seem to be able to meet them 
fully. The great undying souls who have made or 
modified history and human thought live in books, 
pictures and memories, but only in the world of 
silence can they give full comfort and power. For 
we come to know them so intimately that we learn 
how each one of them went about his great work 
carrying a cross of some kind—and the bond of 


FACING THE HARD SITUATION 63 

sympathy to the afflicted grows stronger. You with 
light physical crosses perhaps think that you take 
full inspiration from Milton. Have you ever thought 
how much clearer his message can be to the blind 
or the deaf? Here, then, is our help and our hope. 
Our ears are not dull to the reverberating echoes of 
the past, and we can reach back for the best worldly 
solace—the experience and advice of those w r ho have 
fought the good fight, and won. 

It would be nonsense for anyone to claim that 
he goes through this preparatory course in philos¬ 
ophy with patience or good temper. He misses too 
much. The future is too uncertain. The dread of 
losing the rest of his hearing and the thought of 
the blight which this would mean to his future will 
at times drive the deaf man to desperation. At 
times he is almost willing to take the advice of Job’s 
wife— 

Dost thou still retain thine integrity? Curse Ood 
and die!” 

And some of us never gain the faith and philos¬ 
ophy which make life in the silence endurable. 
Others acquire them slowly by a burning process 
which scars, but in the end gives them new strength. 
I remember two incidents which influenced me dur¬ 
ing the first days of my realization of what was 
ahead. They are of distinctly opposite character. 

One day the regular herder was sick and I took 
bis place, He was q “lunger,” a victim of tuber* 



64 - ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 

culosis, who had waited too long before coming to 
Colorado. At one time I worked with three of these 
men, and I came to know how their disease could 
send them to the top round of ecstasy and to the 
lowest level of depression in a single day. I have 
seen them get up in the morning dancing at the very 
joy of life, planning their “going home” to surprise 
the old folks with their cure. Yet by night perhaps 
they put a handkerchief to the mouth and took it 
away stained with blood—and their spirits would 
fall to earth abruptly. They are even more distress¬ 
ing companions than inhabitants of the silence who 
feel that they have lost life, fortune and future with 
the closing of their ears. 

This herder had built up trouble for me without 
telling me about it. The deaf man usually runs 
blindly into that form of trouble every week of his 
life; it is a sort of legacy which others leave at his 
door. Down the river some two miles lived a ranch¬ 
man who had seeded wheat and made a garden on 
a low flat where the river curved past a bluff. The 
herder had carelessly let the cattle get away from 
him the previous day, and before he could stop them 
several cows had trampled through this garden with 
all the exasperating nonchalance that a fat and 
stupid cow is capable of showing. When a man has 
lived for a year or so on “sow belly,” pancakes and 
potatoes, and when he is naturally inclined to a 
profane disposition of language, he knows precisely 


FACING THE HARD SITUATION 


65 


what to do to the responsible party. As I came 
along the river behind the herd, I saw this ranch¬ 
man and his wife advancing to meet me. He opened 
up at long range, but as I did not know what it was 
all about, and, moreover, could not hear him, I kept 
on riding right up to meet him. My pony had once 
belonged to a mule driver noted for his remarks to 
mules, and the little horse actually seemed to recog¬ 
nize a master in this excited individual. This man’s 
bov afterwards told me that as he advanced his 

t j 

father was relating in a dozen ways in which he 
proposed to punish me. Shooting, it appeared, was 
too easy. He would meet me man to man and roll 
me in the cactus, etc., and worse!. Unfortunately, 1 
did not hear at all until I got close to him, and then 
his breath had failed somewiiat, so that he was not 
doing himself full justice. So I rode right up to him 
and asked him the most foolish of questions—so he 
must have thought: 

“What can I do for yon?” 

He looked at me in amazement. 

“Are you deaf?” 

I told him that I could not hear well. 

“Ain’t you heard a word of what I’ve been handing 
you ?” 

t J 

“Hardly a word!” 

“Well, by God, if that don’t beat all! I’ve wasted 
all them words on a deaf man!” 

There was genuine sorrow in his voice as he spoke 


66 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


of the loss sustained by society through my failure 
to hear. All his anger was gone. 

“Come,” he said. “Get off your horse. The 
woman’s got dinner ready. Come in and eat.” 

“But suppose the cows get on your wheat?” 

“Darn the wheat. I don’t make a new friend like 
you every day. Anyway, the boy can herd ’em.” 

He put his boy on my pony and we went into the 
house, where over coffee, fried pork, riz biscuits and 
rhubarb sauce we pledged eternal friendship. His 
wife was a very happy woman as she explained mat¬ 
ters to me. 

“My man is terrible profane at times. Some men 
go and get drunk now and again to relieve their feel¬ 
ings, but my man don’t do that. He just swears 
something awful, and when it’s all over he’s all 
right again. He was awful to you, but when he 
found out you didn’t hear him, he was terrible 
shocked, and came out of his mad like the man in 
the Scriptures. He met his match at last, and I do 
hope he’ll quit.” 

I have heard that the Indians never torture or 
mutilate a deaf man. They seem to think that he 
is specially protected by the Great Spirit. Here was 
a white man with much the same feeling, and T have 
seen a like forbearance in other cases. T think the 
great majority of human beings seldom or never 
take deliberate advantage of the hard of hearing: 
they may be amused at our blunders or annoyed bv 


FACING THE HARD SITUATION 


67 


our mistakes, but they hesitate to treat us with the 
severity they could justly accord one iu full posses¬ 
sion of his faculties. Some deaf man could probably 
point to bitter personal experiences, but this is my 
own feeling. The above encounter also helps to 
prove what I feel to be a psychological truth—that 
most of our fear comes as a result of sounds reg¬ 
istered by the brain. I frankly confess that if 1 
could have heard this big man I should not have 
gone within a hundred and lifty feet of him. 1 shall 
discuss this phase of fear later; but 1 learned early 
in my affliction that: 

“Cowards die many times before their deaths; 

The valiant never taste of death but once.” 

One January night I was caught out in a Colorado 
blizzard. Only those who have felt and seen the icy 
blasts pour down out of the mountain canyons and 
roar over the plains, driving the hard flakes like 
the volley from a thousand machine guns, can 
realize what it means to face such a blast. The 
cattle turn from such a wind and drift before it, 
half-frozen, heads lowered, moaning with pain. A 
herd of horses will bunch together, heads at the 
center, ready to lash out at the wolves. I was riding 
carelessly, rubbing my frosted ears, when the pony 
stepped into a prairie-dog hole, fell and threw me 
into the snow. Then with a snort, reins dragging, 
he started at a wild run directly into the storm. I 
stood in the snow, in the midst of whirling blackness, 


68 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


with nothing' to guide me except the rapidly filling 
tracks of the deserting horse. 1 knew he was 
headed for home, and I followed as best I could, 
feeling for his tracks in the snow. After wading for 
a few rods, I saw far ahead what seemed like a dim 
star, close to the earth. It grew brighter as I ap¬ 
proached, and sooner than I expected 1 stumbled 
upon a small group of buildings and a sod corral— 
The star proved to be the light in the house window. 
My horse stood with drooping head in front of the 
door. 

Then the door opened and revealed a sheep herder. 
He had on a fur coat and bags were tied about his 
feet. Out he came with his lantern, and we put the 
horse in a shed. The air was filled with a low and 
plaintive crying from the sheep in the corral, 
bunched together where the snow was drifting in 
over them. There was nothing we could do for them, 
so we made our way to the house. 

It was a tiny one-room affair, built of sods piled 
up like bricks, with a roof made of poles cov¬ 
ered with sods and wild hay; it boasted a wooden 
floor. There were a stove, a table, three chairs and 
a small cot. In these days there would be a phono¬ 
graph and a collection of the latest music, but this 
herder’s only constant companions were a dog and a 
canary bird. For fuel there was a small pile of 
cottonwood sticks, a box of buffalo chips, and a 
barrel containing bunches of wild hay tied into 


FACING THE HARD SITUATION 69 

knots. Two other men were there, also driven in by 
the blizzard. I shall always feel that the mental 
picture revealed to me by the contrast between those 
two men in that lonely hut had the greatest deciding 
influence in helping me to fit myself for the life of 
the silent world. 

They were both white-haired old men, though full 
of vigor. One I recognized as the cattle king of 
Northern Colorado. His cattle were everywhere; 
he owned half a town and an army ran at his beck 
and call, yet he could barely write his own name. 
It was said he always signed his checks “Z,” because 
he could not be sure of spelling “Zacliariah” prop¬ 
erly. He had no poetry or imagination, except what 
he could drink out of a jug. In the old days, when 
the plains were ruled by brute force, this man was 
happy, for life becomes tolerable only as we can 
equal our friends in manners and education. But 
how the plains had changed! Schools, churches, 
music, culture, were working in with the towns—• 
the leaven which was to change the soggy biscuit of 
the old life to the “riz bread” of the new. That 
strange, fateful, overmastering thing w T e call educa¬ 
tion was separating the people of the new prairie 
towms into classes more distinct than money and 
material pow r er had ever been able to create. This 
old man had railed and cursed at the change, for 
a premonition of w hat was to come had entered his 
heart, and something told him that his blunt phil- 


;o 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


osophy of life was all wrong. In this country a 
man may climb from poverty up to wealth, or he 
may leave wealth to others, but it is not possible 
for him to climb in the same way up into education, 
and he cannot leave these benefits to those who 
follow him. The old man had begun to fear that he 
had climbed the wrong ladder. There he sat, bitter 
and hateful, chained to prejudice, the slave of ignor¬ 
ance. He had no companion to share his narrow 
prison except his money—the most useless and 
irritating single companion that any man can have 
for the harvest years. 

His companion was about the same age, an 
educated man, a “lunger,” forced to spend the rest 
of his life in these dry plains. I had seen him before 
at the county convention, where there had been talk 
of nominating him for county clerk—a much-desired 
political job. He might have been nominated but 
for his own actions. He stood straight up in the 
convention and said: 

“Gentlemen, I refuse to let my name go before 
this convention. I have been approached by certain 
people who would compromise my manhood, and 
now I would not accept your nomination, even if 
you offered it.” 

Made a fool of himself. Had a cinch and threw 
it away!” 

That was the way they talked in the street after- 


FACING THE HARD SITUATION 


71 


wards; but I remember going home that night with 
this thought dancing through my brain: 

“I wish I could get up and do such things.” 

He would have ranked as a poor man, or at best 
one of modest competence, yet in his enforced exile 
from home and friends he was sustained and com¬ 
forted by a mighty host of men and women who came 
trooping out of history at his call. 

There they sat in the dimly lighted room—the 
cattle king and the scholar, a slave of disease. Their 
chosen companions were about them, and these had 
turned the king into a slave, the slave into a mon¬ 
arch. For one there were only the spirits of hope¬ 
less gloom, grinning, snarling as though they knew 
that fate disdains money in exchange for the things 
which alone can bring comfort and courage into the 
shadow of years. For the other man the dim room 
was crowded with a goodly company—the great 
spirits who live forever in song and story, who 
gladly come back from the unknown country at the 
call of those who have learned to know them. 

I saw all this, and then I seemed to see myself 
in the years that were coming, in the shadow of the 
impending affliction, a resident of the silent world. 
It was evidently to be a choice of masters. I 
remember now as though it were yesterday how on 
that howling night in that dim sod house I made a 
desperate vow that I would, if need be, go through 
fire and acid before T would end my days or sit alone 


72 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


in the silence as mentally hopeless and impotent as 
that “cattle king.” And 1 had been ready to say 
“me, too,” only a short time before to the cowboy 
who said: 

“If I could round up and brand the money old 
Zac-k can, I wouldn’t care how little else I knew.” 

Take a man with dull hearing, little or no educa¬ 
tion, no surplus capital—nothing except health and 
a dim idea that “education” will prove the tool to 
crack the safe wherein is locked opportunity—and 
what college will take and train him? I am sure 
that the colleges to which my boys have gone would 
never have given me a chance. But one fine day in 
September found me entering the gate of the Michi¬ 
gan Agricultural College. 1 do not think I ever 
passed the examination—I think the instructors felt 
somewhat as the Indians do about the deaf. At any 
rate, I entered, not knowing what I wanted or what 
I was fitted for. It might be interesting to see what 
sort of an education may be picked up in this go-as- 
you-please manner, or what is required to fit a man 
lor a happy life in the silent world. However need¬ 
ful it may be for a deaf man to acquire excellence in 
some definite work, it is most of all important that 
he soak in all possible poetry, human sunshine and 
inspiration against the time that he must enter 
prison. 


CHAPTER V 


“A Heart for Any Fate” 

Early Adventures—From Boston to the West—The Milkman 
and the Ear Trumpet—The “Milk Cure”—The Office of 
the Apple—Cases of Mistaken Identity—The Prohibition¬ 
ist and the Missing Uncle George. 

Until I went to Colorado as a young naan to work 
on a dairy ranch, I did not fully realize the possi¬ 
bilities of deafness. I made a long jump to the 
Rocky Mountains. In those days it was something 
of a leap in longitude, culture and occupation. I 
had been working in a publishing house, and for 
several years part of my job had consisted in run¬ 
ning errands for a group of the most distinguished 
authors ever brought together in America. Of 
course, no gentleman can be a hero to his valet, but 
a great author can be more than a hero to his errand 
boy. I went out once and bought a bag of peanuts 
for this merry group of serious-minded men; I sup¬ 
pose I am the only living person who ever ate pea¬ 
nuts with Longfellow, Lowell, Emerson, Holmes, 
Whittier and Aldrich. I saw Dr. Oliver Wendell 
Holmes put a peanut shell on his thumb and shoot 
it across the room at John G. Saxe, as a boy would 
shoot a marble. To me the most impressive of all 
that group of supermen was John Greenleaf Wliit- 

73 


74 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


tier. He was quite deaf, and the affliction troubled 
him greatly. Some of the critics think that his 
inability to hear accurately accounts for some of 
his slips of rhyme. To me the remarkable thing is 
that in all Whittier’s writings I can find only one 
indirect reference to his severe affliction. This is in 
the poem entitled “My Birthday”: 

Better than self-indulgent years 

The outllung heart of youth, 

Than pleasant songs in idle years 

The tumult of the truth. 

* ***** # 

And if the eye must fail of light, 

The ear forget to hear, 

Make clearer still the spirit's sight, 

More fine the inward ear! 

There could be no finer advice for the deaf. I 
think Whittier’s gentle and placid philosophy 
(whose only sting was for slavery) was ripened and 
mellowed by his narrow life, which w T as still more 
closely circumscribed by the years of silence. But 
how strangely does compensation spring from a 
bitter root, and how surely are its best fruits 
reserved for “character”! Denied wide experience 
and education, deprived of one important avenue of 
approach to humanity, nevertheless Whittier’s voice 
came from his lonely hills with a rugged pow r er all 
its own. And the message still rings true and sweet. 
He is truly a noble Apostle of the Silence. 


75 


"a heart for any fate” 

It was indeed something of a jump from sueli 
associations as these to a milking-stool beside a bad¬ 
smelling cow in a dusty barnyard, or out among the 
cactus on the dry plains. Then I soon found that 
1 was on the road to silence. In that dry country 
those who naturally suffer from catarrh are sure to 
have trouble with the head and ears unless they can 
have expert treatment in time. Our ranch was just 
outside a growing town; the cattle were herded on 
the open prairie. We milked our cows in the open 
air in Summer and in low sheds in Winter; the milk 
was peddled from door to door, dipped out of an 
open can, so that the dust might increase the amount 
of milk solids. That was long before these days of 
certified milk or sanitary inspection; I doubt if 
there was a single milk inspector in the whole of 
Colorado. Such milk as we handled could never 
be sold for human consumption in these critical 
modern days. Happily for us, we had never heard 
of germs or bacteria. We doubtless consumed thou¬ 
sands of them with every meal—and rather liked 
the taste! 

Our custom was to drive up in front of a house 
and ring a large bell until someone came out with 
pail or pitcher. The milk was dipped out of the 
can and poured into the open dish. On an early 
morning in cool weather some of our customers were 
slow in responding to the bell. At those times we 
would ring patiently until the side door would open 


76 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


a narrow crack and a hand would appear holding a 
receptacle for the milk. Whenever I saw those hands 
extended, I thought of Whittier’s terrible lines on 
Daniel Webster: “Walk backward with averted 
face.” That was the way we were expected to ap¬ 
proach the door. 

On one occasion the milkman had forgotten his 
glasses, and he was somewhat near-sighted. He rang 
his bell before one house for several minutes with no 
visible response. Finally he saw the front door open, 
and what seemed to him a tin bucket was thrust 
through the opening. Being somewhat familiar with 
the vagaries of lazy housewives, he. filled a quart 
measure with milk and backed up to the door. He 
was careful, for hardly ten minutes before a lady 
holding out a hand in much the same way had 
plainly cautioned him: 

“Walk straight now, and if you bat an eye at this 
door I’ll call my husband!” 

In a community where women were a minority 
such a command was emphatic, so the milkman pro¬ 
ceeded with care and circumspection. Peering abou t 
uncertainly, he carefully poured the milk into what 
he supposed was a milkpail. There was a tre¬ 
mendous commotion within, for quite innocently he 
had sent a forcible message into the world of silence. 
It later appeared that the woman of the house was 
ill and had been greatly disturbed by the bell, so 
Aunt Sarah had volunteered to end the noise. But 


77 


“a heart for any fate” 

Aunt Sarah, though a woman of large and very 
superior intentions, was not an expert on noises. 
She was very deaf, and made use of one of the old- 
fashioned trumpets with a mouthpiece as large as a 
good-sized funnel. She had not been able to fully 
complete her toilet, so she did not throw the door 
wide open; but in order to hear what the milkman 
had to say for himself, she made an opening just 
wide enough to thrust out the mouthpiece of her 
trumpet. The man poured the milk into it—liter¬ 
ally giving Aunt Sarah “an earful.” I have heard 
of several cases where a great nervous shock or a 
long continuance of trouble has suddenly destroyed 
the hearing. I wish I might say that Aunt Sarah’s 
hearing was restored or improved by this milk treat¬ 
ment; the dispenser of the liquid declares that it had 
a striking effect upon her voice, but that she was 
quite unable to appreciate his explanation. Were I 
to repeat some of her remarks, I should add to the 
force of this narrative, but hardly to its dignity. 

The town of Greeley was organized as a temper¬ 
ance community. It was recorded in every deed or 
lease that the title was to be forfeited at any time 
that liquor was sold on the premises, and this regu 
lation was absolutely enforced, for the settlers were 
a band of earnest “cranks,” who saw to it that the 
wheels went ’round. The result was that this town 
contained more cases of near-delirium tremens than 
any other place of equal size in the State. It came 


7« 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


to be a favorite plan for those who had been else¬ 
where on a spree to come to Greeley to sober up. 
They could get no liquor except what they brought, 
and most of that was taken away from them. The 
first time I drove the milk wagon I encountered one 
of these “patients.” At a lonely place on the out¬ 
skirts of town a disreputable character suddenly 
started up from the roadside and caught the horse’s 
bridle with his left hand, meanwhile pointing a long 
forefinger at me. He was red-eyed, unshaven and 
trembly, and I could not hear a word he said. I 
took it to be “Money or your life”—and who ever 
knew a milkman to have money? It turned out that 
he was demanding a quart of new milk with which 
to help float over a new leaf. I had nothing in which 
to serve the milk except the quart measure, but I 
filled that and handed it over. The man sat down 
on the grass and slowly drank his “‘medicine”; then 
I washed the measure in an irrigating ditch and was 
prepared for the next customer. 

This man told me that he was making a desperate 
effort to recover from a protracted spree, and it was 
the general belief that a diet of warm milk was the 
best treatment. It came to be a common thing for 
us to meet these haggard, wild-eyed sufferers, and 
help them to the milk cure. I have seldom heard of 
the treatment elsewhere. It was there considered 
a standard remedy, though I have never been able 
tc understand the psychology or the physiology of 


79 


“a heart for any fate” 

it. A friend of mine who is quite deaf tells me of 
another experience with a new cure for the drink 
habit. 

He took his vacation one Summer on a steamer 
running from Buffalo up the Great Lakes. Among 
other supplies he carried a peck of good apples. I 
cannot say that apples are to be recommended as a 
cure for deafness, but to many of us they are better 
than tobacco for companionship. The first day out, 
while waiting for his fellow-passengers to realize 
that a deaf man was not likely to eat them up or 
convey some terrible disease, my friend took two 
mellow Baldwins, found a shady place on the for¬ 
ward deck, and prepared for a lazy lunch. He was 
about to bite into the first of his fruit when an 
excited man hurried up from below and began talk¬ 
ing eagerly. The deaf man could not imagine what 
it was all about, and while he was trying to explain 
the newcomer snatched the apple out of his hand 
and buried his teeth far into it. My friend was 
reminded of a wild animal half-crazed for food. At 
this moment an anxious-faced woman appeared. 
The man turned to her, and with his mouth well 
filled shouted: 

“Mary, you’ll find it in the false bottom of my 
bag. Get rid of it at once.” 

The woman disappeared on the run, while the 
man finished the first apple and held out his hand 
for the other. Presently she returned with two 


8o 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


bottles of whiskey, and, going to the side of the 
steamer, she deliberately threw them overboard. 
Then, while her husband kept at the apples, she made 
the deaf man understand. 

It appeared that her man was a hard drinker, 
though he was trying with all his poor enfeebled will 
to free himself from the slavery. He had tried many 
“cures,” but the only way to overcome the desire for 
whiskey was to eat sour apples when the craving 
became too strong. It did not always work, but 
frequently this remedy was successful. This trip 
was a vacation for him and his wife, and just before 
the boat had started some of his companions had 
brought him two bottles of whiskey, which he had 
hidden in the bottom of his bag, and he was waiting 
for an opportunity to “enjoy life.” All the morning 
he had been prowling about the boat trying to fight 
off the craving. Finally down in the hold he had 
come upon what he called a “funeral outfit.” There 
was a coffin—but let him tell it. 

“That coffin was going as freight to the last rest¬ 
ing-place, and it made me realize that I was going 
by express to the same place. Beside it stood an 
undertaker—one of those melancholy individuals 
with black burnsides and a long chin. He looked at 
me, and I thought he was saying: 

“ ‘Come on, old man! This is what rum is bringing 
you to. Give me the job.’ ” 


“a heart for any fate” 8i 

“I knew right there that I must decide between 
that coffin and a barrel of apples.” 

There came upon him a fierce craving to brace his 
nerves with some of the whiskey in his bag. He ran 
through the ship praying as fervently as a drowning 
man for some saving straw. He saw the deaf man 
with the Baldwin apple, and he ran to the fruit like 
a hunted animal—eager to bite into it and to ease 
his heated tongue against its sour juice. 

Since I first heard the story I have investigated 
many cases, and have never found a heavy drinker 
who was at the same time a large consumer of raw 
apples. And I have run upon several cases where sour 
apples eaten freely have safely tided men past the 
desire to drink. Surely a prohibition country must 
be one flowing with milk and apples! 

We founded the Apple Consumers’ League largely 
on that theory. Something over twenty-five years 
ago I was lunching at a New York restaurant. There 
was a bumper apple crop that year, and a poor sale 
for it. Looking over the bill of fare, I found 
oranges, prunes and bananas, and an idea struck me. 

“Bring me a baked apple.” 

“We ain’t got none.” 

“What, no baked apples? I thought this was an 
American place.” 

‘“Sorry, boss, but we ain’t got none.” 

By this time everyone within fifty feet was listen- 



82 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


ing. Soon came an anxious-looking man, rubbing 
his hands and trying to smile. 

“Nothing the matter with the food, I hope.” 

1 could not hear much that he said, and it did not 
matter. I did my best to deliver a public lecture on 
the apple, and all around me people were nodding 
as if to say: 

“I’d order one if I could get it.” 

The manager was impressed, and that night for 
supper he had “Baked Apple with Cream” written 
into his card in red ink. Later he came to me and 
asked names of varieties and where they could be 
found. As a result of this experiment a few of us 
founded the “American Apple Consumers’ League.” 
We pledged ourselves to call for apple in some form 
whenever we sat at any public table. Our declara¬ 
tion was cast in rhyme: 

Apple, apple, call for apple 
Everywhere you go. 

Closely scan the bill of fare, 

And if apple is not there 
1 'all the landlord down with care! 

He will come with smirking manner 
Offering the soft banana, 

Or the orange—be not shaken 
In the job you’ve undertaken. 

Call for apple! Call for apple! 

With the problem closely grapple. 


Some commercial travelers took it up, and soon 



83 


“a heart for any fate” 

nearly every restaurant in the country began pro¬ 
viding baked apple. There was one result which we 
did not anticipate. The finer apples do not “stand 
up” well on baking; they are delicious, but they 
flatten to a jelly. The public demands something 
that stands up like an apple in shape. This has 
created a great demand for the coarse-ileshed fruit 
of inferior quality, which will stand up well in the 
pan. 

We came upon another good office of the apple 
in this campaign. It is an ideal toothbrush. We 
found that the bacteria which cause pyorrhea are 
weakened by the mild acid, thus a wash of vinegar 
and water is an excellent remedy. This has been 
verified by dentists, and a mellow, sour apple eaten 
raw is likewise helpful. Using a sour apple as a 
toothbrush ought to be a popular method of scrub¬ 
bing the teeth. 

I have perhaps spent unnecessary time over these 
matters, but in my study of men who live in the 
silent world I have found a number who consider 
the deaf man justified in finding solace in drink. It 
is a most foolish prescription, but I fear the practice 
is all too common. The deaf are subject to periods 
of deep depression, and the argument is that the 
moderate use of alcohol will brighten their lives. I 
can think of nothing more pitiful or ridiculous than 
an intoxicated deaf man. Alcohol is the worst pos¬ 
sible companion for the silence. There, if anywhere, 


8 4 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


tlie faithless and deceitful comrades of life lead only 
to darkness and misery. The deaf man needs every 
moral brace that life can give him; no other char¬ 
acter who tries to find a place and to adjust himself 
to his fellow-men has greater need of the discipline 
which self-denial alone can give. Only the finer and 
more substantial hopes are worth considering when 
music no longer greets us and well-loved voices fade 
away or lose all their tenderness, when they become 
harsh and discordant sounds. Bottled sunshine, 
taken from coal or the electric wire, may be a fair 
substitute for daylight, but bottled happiness will 
finally bring nothing but misery to the deaf. 

And yet you never can tell how people will size 
you up. There was a deaf man who became greatly 
interested in prohibition. He could not even drink 
coffee as a stimulant. He was to be chairman of 
the State prohibition convention, and so started on 
a night train for the meeting. Just before retiring- 
lie read over his speech, and then crawled into his 
berth very well satisfied with himself. About mid¬ 
night he was awakened by a heavy hand on his shoul¬ 
der. You must remember that it is a great shock 
for the deaf to be rudely started from sleep in 
this way; it is then impossible for them to grasp any 
new situation quickly. In the dim light of the Pull¬ 
man our deaf man saw the figure of a man who was 
fumbling about in his suitcase. When he saw that 
he had awakened the sleeper, this intruder left the 


85 


“a heart for any fate” 

case, opened the curtains and held out his hand with 
some object presented straight at the deaf man’s 
head. As he was evidently asking some question, 
the deaf man imagined that he was a train robber 
presenting a pistol with a “Hands up” “Money or 
your life,” or some such appropriate remark. The 
prohibition orator thrust up his hands and said: 

“I’m deaf. Take it all!” 

The “train robber” talked for a while and then 
lowered his hand, took the deaf man by the arm and 
led him to the smoking-room. There the “robber” 
turned out to be the colored porter, with no pistol, 
but a glass bottle in his hand. Finally, he slowly 
and laboriously wrote out the following: 

“Man in lower jour sick. Has got to have brandy. 
Says you look like a sport and probably have it on 
you. Can you fill this bottle?” 

They had taken our prohibition friend for the 
other sort of a “rum-punisher.” Such cases of mis¬ 
taken identity are quite common to the deaf, and 
some of them are never fully untangled. 

Once when I entered a crowded dining-room in 
New York City a young woman jumped up from a 
table and greeted me with every evidence of affec¬ 
tion. I had never seen her before, and was greatly 
embarrassed, especially as I could not hear a word 
she said. I tried to explain, but she continued talk¬ 
ing rapidly, holding me by the arm. Of all the 
people present, no one thought of coming to my aid 


86 ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 

except the colored waiter. He was the good Samari¬ 
tan who talked to the lady and wrote out her story 
for me on the back of his order card. She thought 
I was her Uncle George, who had agreed to meet her 
there. She insisted that I was playing a practical 
joke in pretending that I was only a plain and some¬ 
what bewildered deaf man. Finally she obtained a 
side view of my face which convinced her of her 
mistake, and then, greatly startled by the publicity 
she had caused, she hurried away. To this day I 
do not know who “Uncle George” was or if he ever 
found his niece. My colored interpreter, however, is 
still on duty, and frequently writes out for me the 
conversations of people near by. 


CHAPTER VI 


Memories of Early Life 

Reflection versus Conversation—Old Memories—The Lec¬ 
ture and the Whipping—Education and the Stick—Rid¬ 
icule Unbearable to the Deaf—The Office Fight—The 
Dangers of Bluffing. 

The deaf man may not excel in conversation, but 
he is usually strong on reflection. He has plenty 
of time, for his life is roughly divided into three chief 
periods, working, sleeping and thinking. It may 
safely be said that the character and temper of the 
deaf are determined rather by their thought than by 
their work. The greater part of their thinking is a 
form of mental analysis. They like to go back to 
the beginning of things. That is why the deaf man 
is such a remarkably superior specimen of a “grouch” 
when he puts himself to the task of analyzing his 
own troubles. If you could read the thoughts of the 
deaf as they sit by themselves without book or work 
you would find that they are searching the past to 
find something which may be compared to their pres¬ 
ent experience. 

It is a curious mental sensation, probably far dif¬ 
ferent from anything that comes to you in your 
world of sound, unless it comes in moments of depres- 

87 


88 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


sion, or when you are deeply stirred by old memories. 
Sometimes in the evening we become tired of reading 
and we cannot join in the music or chatter about us; 
it is too dark to work outdoors, and we have accom¬ 
plished enough for the day. So we amuse ourselves 
by trying to go back to the beginnings of things. 
When did I first fall in love with the portly lady who 
sits at the other side of the fire ? How much smaller 
was she then? When did I find the first gray hair? 
When did I first discover that my eyes had failed so 
that I could not read signs across the way? When 
did I begin to discover something of the real life 
difference between work and play? We think these 
things out to no particular advantage, except that 
perhaps they may form a text for a moral lecture 
to our young people. And now I find that my chil¬ 
dren very properly pay little attention to my lec¬ 
tures. I have stopped delivering them since going 
back to the original dissertation given for my benefit. 

The old gentleman who brought me up was much 
addicted to the lecture cure for youthful depravity. 
He would seat me in the corner on a little cricket, 
and with his long forefinger well extended would 
depict the sin and laziness of “this young genera- 
tion” whenever I forgot to water the horses or to 
feed the hens. I can see him now, with his spectacles 
pushed up to the top of his bald head, and that thick 
finger projected at me as he recounted the hardships 
of his own boyhood, and his own faithful and unfail- 


MEMORIES OF EARLY LIFE 


89 


ing service. What a remarkable boy he must have 
been! Then his wife, who was very deaf, and, more 
unfortunately, very inquisitive, would appear at the 
door and shout: “What say?” Her husband would 
patiently gather his lungs full of air, make a trumpet 
of his hands and roar in her ear: 

“I’m telling the boy about the terrible sin and 
danger of this young generation. What kind of a 
world will it be, 1 ask you, when such boys as that 
grow up to control things? It will be another Baby¬ 
lon, and I don’t want to live to see it.” 

And his wife, getting only a word here and there, 
would quote some appropriate passage from Isaiah 
and go back to her work well satisfied that she had 
done her duty. 

“Behold, I and the children whom the Lord has 
given me are for signs and for wonders in Israel:” 
And now it seems to me, as I sit here, a gray-haired 
man of the silent world, that I have seen many of 
the signs and wonders, though I did not recognize 
them as they passed by. That “sinful young genera¬ 
tion” has grown up, and men of my age may be said 
to control the nation. It seems to me that it is a 
good world after all, and I believe that my mischief¬ 
making children will grow up into a steadily develop¬ 
ing generation which will make it better yet. For 
here in the silent world we learn to smile at youthful 
antics, and to have great charity for them. 

The earliest incident of my childhood that I can 


90 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


remember is the time my father pretended to give us 
a whipping My older brother and I had been sent 
to bed in disgrace, to wait for father to come home 
and administer punishment. I can just recall that 
we were up in a New England attic, in the bed at 
the head of the stairs, surrounded by a collection of 
trunks, boxes and old rubbish which a thrifty house¬ 
wife always puts “upstairs.” She is too economical 
to throw them away, and too neat to have them in 
sight downstairs. I think the town bell was faintly 
■ inging, as it always did at six o’clock, and there 
was a sound like a gentle tapping as the water 
lapped at the wharf in high tide. I can just dimly 
remember the sunshine streaming in through the 
dusty window as we lay there in bed. The dust 
danced and floated in it like a flock of tiny flies. 
Since then I have read much of history. There have 
been many occasions when brave souls have waited 
for death or an ominous sentence. These scenes 
haunt the deaf; we cannot talk and laugh them away 
as others do. We must put down our book and go 
back in memory, seeking something in our own lives 
which may even remotely resemble what we have 
read. That is part of the penalty which must come 
with the silence. I remember reading a powerful de¬ 
scription of Louis XVI on the night before his exe¬ 
cution. A well-meaning, easy-going man, he had 
never been able to realize the serious side of life until 
it suddenly peered in through his window with the 


MEMORIES OF EARLY LIFE 


91 


hideous face of Revolution. Then, face to face with 
death, he rose to that dignity “which doth become a 
king.” As I read that passage I put my book down, 
and, ridiculously enough, there flashed into my mind 
the picture of these two little boys waiting for the 
coming of father with his stick. We had determined 
that we would not cry, no matter how hard he hit us. 
That was our nearest approach to “dignity.” 

I think that even then my hearing was a little 
defective. I heard my father come in below, and 
mother’s clear voice was certainly intended for our 
hearing. 

“Now, Joseph, you go right up and whip those boys! 
They would not mind me, and you must do it.” 

All through my life I have somehow managed to 
hear the unpleasant remarks or thorns of life. We 
deaf usually miss the bouquets. Poor father! The 
Civil War was raging, and he had volunteered. My 
young people seem to think that the Civil War was 
a mere skirmish beside the great World War just 
ended. Perhaps so, if we count only money and men, 
yet our part in this recent conflict was but a play¬ 
thing in intense living, in sentiment, and breaking 
up of family life, as compared with the war of the 
sixties. Father was to leave home for the front in 
less than a week. He was captain of the local com¬ 
pany, and should probably have been stronger in 
family discipline. But his heart was tender. He 
did not want to whip his boys, and he protested, as 


92 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


many a man lias done. I could not hear what he 
said, but I knew from the expression on my brother’s 
face that he was protesting. Tonight, after these 
long and toilsome years have boiled out much of 
ambition and the desire to know the great things of 
life, I wish most keenly that I could have heard what 
my father said. 

But mother insisted, as good women do, and finally 
we heard the big man slowly mounting the stairs. I 
can see him now as he stood framed in the doorway 
with the bright splinter of sunshine bathing him 
in light; a tall man with a strong, kindly face and 
a thick black beard. It is the only real memory I 
have of my father, for he did not come back from the 
war alive. Long, long years after, I sat at a great 
banquet next to a famous Senator, who had seen 
much of life. I told him that I have only this mem¬ 
ory of my father, but that I had finally found a man 
who had served in the same regiment with him, slept 
in the same tent, who had known him intimately as 
a man. 

“Now,” I asked, “shall I hunt up that man and 
have him tell me in his own way just what kind of a 
man my father was?” 

Quickly the answer came from this hardened old 
diplomat: 

“Keep away from him! Let him alone! Never go 
near him! Burn his letters without reading them. 
You now have an ideal of your father. This man 


MEMORIES OF EARLY LIFE 


93 


knows him as just a plain, common man, probably 
with most of the faults of humanity. Let him alone! 
If at your age God has permitted you to retain an 
ideal of any human being, keep it pure. Take no 
chances of having it blackened!” 

I took his advice, and have always been glad that 
I did so. It has been my experience that deaf men 
are able to hold their ideals longer than those who 
can hear; probably this is another part of our com¬ 
pensation. I would advise every man of the silent 
world to build up a hobby and gain an ideal. One will 
serve to keep hand and brain busy, the other helps 
to keep the soul clean. I heard one deaf man say 
that clean ideals mark the difference between a 
"grouch” and a gentleman. 

My father came slowly to the bed where we lay, 
tuning his voice as nearly to a growl as the nerves 
between the vocal chords and the heart-strings would 
permit. 

"Ill attend to your case, young men! Ill teach 
you to mind your mother!” 

Then he began to strike the pillow with his hand, 
growling as before. 

“Now, will you mind your mother when she speaks 
to you ?” 

It was one of those cases of thought suggestion 
which I have mentioned. My brother and I under¬ 
stood. No one can prove that father told us to cry 
and help him play his part. Like the horses in the 


94 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


pasture, we understood. We screamed lustily as 
father spanked the pillow, though we had fully agreed 
between us that we would endure it all without a 
sound. In fact, we carried out our part so well that 
mother, listening below to see that father did not 
shirk his duty, finally came running upstairs to 
defend her brood. 

“You ought to be ashamed of yourself, Joseph, to 
hurt those little boys so! They did nothing so very 
bad !” And there was a great loving time, with 
mother holding us close and making little crooning 
sounds as she swayed back and forth with us. Father 
stood by, trying to act the part of stern parent, with 
indifferent success. And then he carried us down¬ 
stairs, a reunited family, where we boys each had a 
doughnut with our bread and milk. 

That was nearly sixty years ago, and I have been 
forced to stand up and take punishment for many 
sins and omissions. If father had lived, it is not 
likely that we would have discussed this little decep¬ 
tion, but it still would have been a beautiful memory. 
My wife, who was once a school teacher, strong in 
discipline, says it was a great mistake on father’s 
part. Perhaps I show this in defects of character. 
He should have taken a shingle to us, she says. Per¬ 
haps so ; yet after all these years (and what test can 
compare with time?) I am glad he acted as he did. 
If I were starting on his long journey, I should be 
likely to treat my children in the same way. 


MEMORIES OF EARLY LIFE 


95 


I have often been asked if deaf people of middle 
age can safely be entrusted with the bringing up 
of a little child. That depends—both on the grown 
people and the child. Generally speaking, I should 
not advise it. Deaf people are likely to be obstinate 
in their opinions, rather narrow in thought, and slow 
to understand that the habits and tendencies of 
society grow like a tree. Many of them have made 
a brilliant success in certain lines of work, but they 
are apt to be narrow as a board outside of their lim¬ 
ited range. In rearing a child it is a great disadvan¬ 
tage not to be able to hear its little whispered con¬ 
fidences; if the little one has no reliable confidant 
it will grow up hard and unsympathetic, or it will 
go with its confidences to the wrong person. I know 
deaf people who regret bitterly that they can only 
give financial aid and reasonable example to their 
children, while they long to enter into that part of 
child life which can only be reached through sound. 

Looking back over life, I become convinced that 
my hearing was always a little dull; probably the 
trouble started in a case of scarlet fever when I was 
a baby, and in those days no one thought of examin¬ 
ing or treating the ears of a child. Also, I think one 
of my teachers helped to start me along the road to 
silence. Those were the days when “corporal pun¬ 
ishment” was not only permitted, but was encour¬ 
aged. Most of us were brought up on the “Scrip¬ 
tures and a stick,” and each teacher seemed to select 


9 6 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


some special portion of the human anatomy as the 
most susceptible part through which to make her 
authority felt. Some of the educational methods of 
those days were effective even if they were violent. 
I have had the teacher point a long stick at me and 
issue the order: 

“Spell incomprehensibility!” 

I would stumble on as far as “ability” and then 
fall down completely. In these days my children 
are led gently over the bad place in the road, but 
then we took it at a jump. The teacher would lay 
that long stick three times over your back, and while 
the dust was rising from your jacket would make 
another demand. 

“Now spell it!” 

And I must confess that we were then usually able 
to do so. This particular teacher chose the ear for 
her point of attack; she would steal up behind a 
whisperer or a loiterer and strike him over the ears 
with a large book, like a geography. Or she would 
upon occasion pull some special culprit out to the 
front of the school by the lobe of the ear. Such 
things are no longer permitted in the public schools, 
yet I frequently see people in sudden anger slap or 
“box” their children on the side of the face or on the 
ears. It is a cruel and degrading punishment, and, 
remembering my own experience, I always feel like 
striking those who are guilty of it squarely in their 
own faces with all my power. 


MEMORIES OF EARLY LIFE 


97 


What annoys the deaf man most is the suggestion 
that he is being used as the butt for ridicule. We 
can stand abuse or open attack with more or less 
serenity, but it is gall and wormwood to feel that 
there are those who can make sport of our serious 
affliction. I once worked on a newspaper where one 
of the editors was absolutely deaf, unable to hear 
his own voice. He was a big man, naturally good- 
natured and reasonably cheerful. The foreman of 
the composing-room was a man of medium size, and 
a great “bluffer.” Sometimes he would try to im¬ 
press strangers in the office by using the big deaf 
man as a chopping block for courage. He would get 
out of sight behind, shake his fist over the poor fel¬ 
low’s head and roar out his challenge: 

“You big coward; for five cents I’d lift you out of 
that chair and mop up the floor with you. Step out 
in the street and I’ll knock your block off!” 

It was very cheap stuff, though quite effective. The 
deaf man, of course, didn’t hear a word of it, but 
kept on with his work, and many visitors considered 
the foreman courageous for calling down a much 
larger man. But one day the editor chanced to see 
the reflection of that fist in his glasses. He looked 
up suddenly and caught the foreman right in the act 
The deaf think quickly and accurately in a crisis, 
and in an instant this man was on his feet, pulling 
off his coat. He did not know what it was all about, 
but here was a man taking advantage of his afflic- 


98 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


tion. There is something more than impressive about 
the wrath of the deaf, and the foreman ran behind a 
table, took a piece of paper and wrote the following: 

“I cannot fight. I promised a Christian mother 
that I would never strike a cripple, or a deaf or a 
blind man!” 

The deaf man read the communication and made 
but one remark: 

“I am under no such obligation!” 

The way he polished off his tormentor was a joy 
to us all. He could not hear the foreman yell 
“Enough!” and we did not notify him until the job 
was perfectly done. 

However, the deaf man will be wise if he keeps out 
of quarrels. When they arise suddenly he cannot 
tell which side he ought to be on. I have taken part 
vigorously in several sudden and violent battles only 
to find when it was all over that I had been doing 
valiant work—on the wrong side! Likewise, “bluff¬ 
ing” is taboo. Few men can ever escape with even 
the wreckage of a “bluff” unless it is safely mounted 
on skids of sound. We all learn these things by 
hard experience before we discover the limitations 
of the silent life. 

Some years ago I attended a banquet where a great 
company of lions appeared to have gathered to feed 
and to listen to a few roars after the meal. The man 
next to me would have made a splendid “announcer” 
for a circus. Here, he told me, was a famous states- 


MEMORIES OF EARLY LIFE 


99 


man ; Iliat man over there might have been Presi¬ 
dent ; this man had enough money to buy a European 
state; the man helping himself to a double portion 
of terrapin was a poet; the big man nibbling his bit 
of cheese was a well-known historian. He was a 
man of great ability, though unfortunately somewhat 
deaf, which fact naturally interested me so much 
that I kept an eye on the historian. 

When the toastmaster began his “We have with us 
tonight,” it seemed as though every speaker felt that 
he carried a ticket to a front seat in the Hall of 
Fame, and in an evil hour I decided to attempt a 
little ‘“bluff.” I rose for a few remarks on agricul¬ 
ture. Pedigree or good stock is essential to good 
farming, so it was easy to refer to “my ancestor, 
Lord Collingwood.” I had read somewhere that 
Lord Collingwood was present at the Battle of 
Bunker Hill as a petty officer on one of the English 
warships. It was quite easy to refer to the fact that 
I had one ancestor in that battle wearing a red coat 
and another behind the American breastworks wear¬ 
ing overalls! What would have happened to me if 
both had been killed? It was what we call very 
cheap stuff—too cheap for a deaf man to handle. It 
was a very silly thing to do, but for the moment it 
seemed to impress the audience. Out of the cor¬ 
ner of my eye I saw the historian with his hand at 
his ear whisper to his companion and then make 
notes on a sheet of paper. 


TOO 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


“Ah,” I thought with gratification, “I have im¬ 
pressed the great historian!” And I sat down think¬ 
ing very well of myself. But the eminent historian 
folded his paper and sent it to me by a waiter. This 
is what I read: 

“Are you sure of your pedigree? The facts seem 
to be that Lord Collingwood had only two children, 
both daughters. I think neither of them ever mar¬ 
ried?’ 

Then and there I lost interest in my ancestors. 
I have no further desire to trace back my pedigree, 
especially in the presence of well-read historians. 
And I am cured of “bluffing.” 


CHAPTER VII 


Experimenting With the Deaf Man 

Deafness Cures—We Forget to Listen—Science and Scent—• 
Lip Reading—Judging Character. 

We all have our pet aversions, and with deaf 
people the popular candidate for this position is the 
man who is positive that he can cure the disease. 
The “hope-deferred” period comes to most of us, and 
for a time we try every possible remedy, only to find 
that the affliction is still marching steadily upon us. 
Then it is the part of wisdom to give up the experi¬ 
menting and to dig in as a line of defense all the 
humor and philosophy we can muster. It is not so 
much resignation to our fate as it is determination 
to make that fate luminous with hope and good cheer. 
Miraculous cures which restore the wasted organs 
of the body may now and then be possible, but they 
are not probable, while it is certain that too long 
a period of hope deferred will cause a sickness of 
the soul as well as of the heart. 

Many cannot agree with this philosophy. I think 
they add to the terror and trouble of their lives by 
submitting their poor bodies to a continuous series 
of experiments. There was a prominent merchant 
in New York, blind, with a disease which the best 

IOI 


102 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


physicians declared incurable. He made a standing 
offer of a quarter of a million to anyone who would 
restore his sight. His theory was that this constant 
experimenting and treatment kept hope and faith 
alive. My own experience with the deaf does not 
point that way. I truly consider it wiser to devote 
the spirit which may be wasted in false expectation 
to the task of making the silent land endurable. 1 
know of a woman for whom a tuberculosis expert 
prescribed a dry, hilly country, a simple diet and 
a cheerful mode of life, involving little or no medi¬ 
cine. She settled in the country, and some local 
“quack” told her that a friend had been cured by 
taking whiskey in which pine chips had been soaked. 
This intelligent woman, considering her doctor’s 
treatment too mild, was actually ready to follow this 
method. As a boy I lived with people whose lives 
were long experiments with deafness cures. At that 
time the country was full of unlicensed practitioners, 
who went about promising to cure every possible 
disease, and our folks tried them all, just as they 
sampled every new brand of patent medicine. Even 
now, many deaf men, and especially those who live 
in the country or small towns, must expect to be 
regarded as human experiment stations. We can 
all relate remarkable experiences with the various 
“cures” which have been tried out on us. From skunk 
oil to chiropractic and back again, we know every 
way station. Few persons appear to aspire to cur- 


EXPERIMENTING WITH THE DEAF MAN 103 

iug blindness, but in every community in which I 
have ever lived were several individuals who were 
certain that they could successfully handle diseases 
of the ear. I have seen them stand impatient, their 
fingers fairly itching to get hold of me. Usually 
their “knowledge” of the ear is merely that they 
recognize it as the organ of hearing, yet they are 
quite ready to rush in where aurists hesitate to 
enter. Most of the quack remedies may be harmless, 
yet sometimes these practitioners have done great 
injury where relief might have been obtained through 
proper care. I think several of them injured me, 
and I should feel like taking a shotgun to one ot 
these amateur aurists were I to find him operating 
on one of my children. I wish I knew why the com¬ 
munity deaf man of a country neighborhood is con¬ 
sidered so fair a subject for experimentation. Prob¬ 
ably in some cases it is really a nuisance to commu¬ 
nicate with him, and again he may be the object of 
genuine sympathy, perhaps with an admixture of 
curiosity. I have run the whole gauntlet, and should 
need an entire book to report all the remedies sug¬ 
gested or actually tried on me. 

Perhaps the most popular “cure” is skunk oil. 
This theory appears to be that since the skunk has 
a very acute sense of hearing, he can communicate 
this faculty to a human, through his oil. Person¬ 
ally, I believe the skunk to be a lazy, stupid beast, 
with hearing below normal; but, at any rate, we 


104 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


are earnestly told that oil from a skunk, if dropped 
into the ears, will surely improve their hearing. No 
man has ever given this remedy a fairer trial than I 
have done. Later an aurist diagnosed my case as 
a disorder of the interior ear which was rather 
encouraged than cured by the application of the oil. 
Another “remedy,” based on a similar principle, is 
an exclusive diet of pork. Here the excellent ears 
of the pig are to be transmitted to the consumer! 
1 have been several times presented with the argu¬ 
ment that deafness is more prevalent among the 
Jews and other 11011-pork eaters than among any 
other class. Also, they say that the disease of deaf¬ 
ness was rarely known among the earlier pioneers, 
who lived mostly on “hog and hominy.” Possibly 
this was due to the fact that corn grows on “ears.” 
At any rate, here are fair samples of the arguments 
which are submitted to the unfortunate deaf. One 
Winter, when I taught school and “boarded round,” 
I experienced a full course of treatments based on 
this remedy. It was started by the school trustee, 
an economical soul, who sold his butter and fed his 
family on pork fat. In those days we were innocent 
of bacteria or vitamines, and this clever adaptation 
of a deafness cure helped the trustee to avoid 
the local odium which would naturally center upon 
a householder who fed the teacher on lard. And 
with one accord the neighbors joined in the good 
work. I moved to a new family each week, and as 


EXPERIMENTING WITH TIIE DEAF MAN 105 

the news of the projected treatment spread, each 
farmer killed a hog just before my arrival. 1 ate 
fresh pork every day for three months. Ungrate¬ 
fully enough, I did not recover my hearing, but the 
treatment surely roused the sporting instinct in that 
neighborhood. Near the close of the term this com¬ 
ment was reported to me: 

“No, it ain’t done him no good—he can’t scarcely 
hear it thunder; but I’ll bet fifty dollars he’s raised 
bristles on his back.” 

At another time one of these experimenters took 
me up into the church belfry, ostensibly to “see the 
country.” As I stood beside the bell, he suddenly 
struck it a hard blow with a hammer, on the theory 
that this sudden and violent noise would “break up 
die wax in my ear” and “frighten the muscle into a 
new grip”—whatever that may mean. He protested 
that his grandfather had been cured in this way. 
This same investigator once tried a very radical 
treatment on his deaf hired man. It was Sunday 
afternoon, and the man had sought surcease from 
sorrow in a nap in the haymow. The boss knew how 
to handle bees, so he selected one from his hives, 
caught it safely by its wings, and, climbing the hay¬ 
mow, he dropped the buzzing creature into the ear 
of the sleeping hired man. He was working on a 
supposition that the man had forgotten how to listen, 
and that the buzzing of the bee, and possibly his 
sting, would shock him into remembering. But the 


io6 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


victim merely started up from sleep like an insane 
man, and ruslied screaming to the brook, where he 
ducked his head vigorously under water and drowned 
the bee, For long weeks the poor fellow feared to 
go to sleep unless his ears were stuffed full of cotton. 

I asked the boss how he ever came to devise such a 
treatment for deafness. He explained that some 
years before he had had a sick cow, who had ‘dost 
her courage.” She positively refused to stand up, 
though she might easily have done so. I have also 
had cows act this way; they seem suddenly to have 
become “infirm of purpose,” and will die before they 
will exert themselves. A horse under similar cir¬ 
cumstances will finally struggle to regain its feet, 
but the cow completely loses her nerve and will not 
try. I have had such a cow lifted off the ground by 
a rope and pulley, and yet refuse to use her legs. 
This farmer told me that he called in a local “horse 
doctor,” who suddenly threw a good-sized dog on 
the cow's back. The dog barked and scatched, and 
under the influence of sudden fear the cow scrambled 
to her feet and instantly regained the power to walk. 
This farmer really was wiser than he knew, for there 
are some cases of deafness, such as those caused by 
shell shock, which consist in the loss of the ability to 
listen. Of course, our use of instruments or lip- 
reading dulls the art of listening intently, in any 
case, and it finally passes completely out of use. In 


EXPERIMENTING WITH THE DEAF MAN 107 

some instances, where the actual ear is unimpaired, 
this faculty may be shocked back into use. 

I once had an old lady solemnly assure me that 
a plaster made from the lard of a white sow and the 
wool from the left ear of a black sheep would surely 
cure any case of deafness. Query: Could the black 
sheep of a family effect a simpler cure by rubbing 
on the lard and brushing his hair down over it? 

These are but samples of the dozens of ridiculous 
“cures” which have been suggested to me, or even 
put into operation. I can vouch for the comparative 
virtues of skunk oil, vibration, or the inflation of 
the Eustachian tubes at the hands of a skilled aurist. 
And, after all, I feel that in many cases the doom is 
sure, and that the best alleviation for the future 
silent days is the store of accumulated philosophy 
and sunshine. It seems to me that the surgery and 
general treatment of the ears has not kept pace with 
the successful handling of diseases of other organs. 
Some real “cure” may be developed, but hardly in 
my day. I consider the study of lip-reading the 
most useful course for the deaf, and we may at least 
prepare for the next generation by having the ears 
of our children watched as carefully as we watch 
their teeth, their eyes, their hands and feet. 

For lip-reading one must have good eyes and a 
quick brain. Some of us deaf become proficient in 
the use of the science, and I think its practice will 
extend and become far more general. I have some 


io8 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


little knowledge of it, though I have not made it a 
prolonged study. It would be difficult for me to 
explain exactly why I have not studied the science 
more carefully. For many years my aurist told me 
that my great hope for holding such hearing as I 
had was to force myself to listen, even though I 
could get little of conversation. He thought that 
the constant use of instruments or of lip-reading 
would weaken and finally destroy my limited natural 
hearing, so that in time I should forget how to listen 
and hear. This advice was, no doubt, good, though 
if I were to go through life again I should make a 
thorough study of lip-reading, anyway. In fact, I 
once started seriously enough, but was switched 
away by a curious and disheartening discovery. I 
began practicing on the train, studying intently 
the faces of men and women, trying to take their 
words from their lips. Next to the ability to read 
thought comes for interest and excitement the power 
of interpreting ordinary conversation when the 
speaker has no thought of betraying his communi¬ 
cations to outsiders. I succeeded only too well with 
one man. I had always supposed him to be a person 
of high character, and had been wont to envy the 
recipients of his conversation. I finally was able 
to read his lips, only to find that all of his talk was 
trivial, and some of it filthy beyond expression. I, 
in my silence, busy with my gleanings from good 
literature, had fancied that my companions were 


EXPERIMENTING WITH THE DEAF MAN IO 9 


using a gift priceless to me, and denied, for what 
we may honestly call “the glory of God.” My little 
essay into lip-reading was thus discouraged; it 
seemed suddenly a waste of time. Youth is probably 
the best time for studying lip-reading, when the 
spirit for riding down obstacles and discouragements 
is stronger. 

The inexplicable sixth sense—a sort of intuition 
which we deaf acquire—appears to be even stronger 
in afflicted animals than in men. Sometimes it leads 
to an amusing outcome. In a certain New England 
State a law was passed prohibiting exports of quail, 
and a well-informed scientist was put in charge of 
it. He knew all about the habits of quail, but little 
about the practical side of legal enforcement. He 
made a tour through the State to consult with his 
deputies, and in one locality he found a rough old 
farmer serving as game warden; an independent old 
fellow, very deaf, most opinionated, with small 
respect for professional knowledge. His constant 
companion was a little mongrel dog, also very deaf. 
A strange silent combination they made, but they 
carried a State-wide reputation for “spotting quail.” 

The clash came at the railroad station, where the 
professor was waiting for his train, completely dis¬ 
gusted with the appearance and general attitude of 
the warden. The latter came slouching along the 
platform with the small brown dog at his heels, and 
the face of the learned man became as a book, in 




no 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


which the countryman could “read strange matters.” 
The deaf are prompt to act when action seems neces¬ 
sary or desirable. They do not join in useless pre¬ 
liminaries. Quickly aud decisively the game warden 
opened the campaign. 

“You’re going home to fire me, but before you leave 
I want to tell you before this crowd that you don’t 
know as much about this business as my dog Jack 
does. He’s deaf, too!” 

There are few situations more damaging to dignity 
than a public argument Tvith an angry deaf person—* 
especially when the participator with good ears is a 
polished gentleman and ladies are present. Again, 
some men might appreciate the compliment of being 
associated with a large, noble-looking dog. But the 
professor glanced at Jack and fully realized the 
size of the insult. Here was just a little brown dog 
of no particular breed, with one ear upright and the 
other lying limp, evidence of previous injury in a 
fight. How was the professor to know that because 
the outer door of those ears was shut the brain had 
been forced to greater activity. And here was a 
shambling backwoodsman telling a Ph. D. that this 
disreputable creature was his mental superior! The 
professor was too indignant for words, but the game 
warden was ready to continue: 

“I’ll prove it! I’ll prove it right here. There’s 
a shipment of quail going out of this town right now. 
Eight on this platform are three farmers, an old 


EXPERIMENTING WITH THE DEAF MAN 


III 


woman with a basket, two drummers with bags, old 
man Edwards with a trunk, and that young woman 
with a fiddle case. Who’s got the quail? Here’s a 
case where it don’t do us no good to know how many 
eggs a quail lays or how many potato bugs she has 
in her gizzard. Who’s got the quail ? Can you tell ?” 

“Why,” gasped the indignant professor, “do you 
suppose I am going to insult this young woman by 
intimating that she is a quail runner? And these 
gentlemen? It’s preposterous!” 

“‘It is, hey? Give it up, do ye? Well, we’ll try 
Jack. He can’t hear nothing, but his ears have went 
to nose. Sic ’em, Jack!” And he snapped his 
fingers at the little dog. 

Jack put up his one capable ear and trotted along 
the platform, applying his scarred nose to each pack¬ 
age. He sniffed at the bags of the drummers, nosed 
the trunk and the baskets, and finally came to the 
violin case of the beautiful young woman. The 
instant his nose touched that case every hair on 
Jack’s back stood erect and that broker ear came 
as near to rising as it ever had done since the fight. 
Jack was undoubtedly “pointing” at the hiding- 
place of the quail. In spite of the young woman’s 
protest, the warden opened the case, and inside were 
thirteen quail, snugly packed. Probably the lady 
could not even play the “Kogue’s March” on a real 
violin. 

And the farmer strode up triumphantly to the 


112 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


professor. Shaking a long forefinger, he stated an 
evident truth. 

“Professor, mebbe you’ve got the science, but you 
hain’t got the scent!” 

Some of you who think that the loss of hearing 
can never be replaced by a new sense may well be 
wary in your dealings with the deaf. There are those 
like Jack, whose “ears have went to nose” and their 
“scent” is quite too acute to be deceived. 

I am often asked how we pass our time when we 
are alone or unoccupied. We cannot, of course, 
beguile the time with music or the conversation of 
chance acquaintance. In some way the mind must 
be kept occupied—an idle mind leads to depression, 
the first step of the trip to insanity. One’s eyes 
weary of constant reading. Perhaps our loneliest 
situations are found in the great crowds. I have 
invented all sorts of schemes to keep my mind busy 
In the old days, when I crossed the Hudson daily 
to New York on a ferryboat, I would count the num¬ 
ber of revolutions which the great wheel required to 
take us over. I had the average of many trips. 1 
have gathered all sorts of statistics. What propor¬ 
tion of men in a crowd wear soft hats? How many 
wear straw hats after the regulation date for shed¬ 
ding them? Does the majority of women wear black 
hats ? What proportion of men cross the knee when 
sitting? Does a right-handed man ease his left leg 
in this way? What proportion of the dark-colored 


EXPERIMENTING WITH THE DEAF MAN 113 

horses one sees have the white spot or star on the 
forehead? I started that investigation and was 
astonished to find how common this white star is. 
Then I went through all available books to learn 
how this star originated. Is it the remnant of a 
blazed face ? I have never solved my question. Such 
investigation is a marvelous help to the deaf. 

Another of my plans is character study. I try to 
determine the occupation and general character of 
strangers from their appearance, their habits and 
the books they read. You would be surprised at the 
accuracy of the observant deaf man in detecting 
these external marks which he comes to understand. 
He finally secures a most interesting chart of hu¬ 
manity, for in spite of us, character and occupation 
will leave a stamp upon the face and actions. But 
we cannot always classify strangers accurately. 
Here is one of my curious blunders: I saw daily 
on the train a big, brutal-looking fellow with a red 
face, a flat nose, well-protected eyes, and enormous 
arms and shoulders. I finally classified him as a 
prize-fighter. One day he was reading a small book, 
in which he was making frequent marks and com¬ 
ments. I reasoned that it must be some new version 
of the “Manly Art of Self-Defense.” Soon my man 
put down his book and went into the next car. Of 
course, I could not resist the impulse to glance at 
the volume. It was “The Influence of Christian 
Character in College Work.” My prize-fighter turned 


114 ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 

out to be a professor in a theological seminary. At 
any rate, he was in the battle against evil. 

No other persons can ride a hobby so gracefully 
and to such good purpose as the deaf are able to do. 
No matter what it is, however childish, so long as 
it can keep the mind clean and busy, it is our most 
wholesome mental exercise. I know a deaf farmer 
who late in life started to collect and properly name 
every plant that grew on his farm. It was not only 
a wonderful help to him, but he became an expert 
botanist. And this recalls a discussion perennial 
with deaf men. Will they be happier in the country 
or in the city? The person inexperienced in deafness 
will immediately decide for the country, but I am 
not so sure that he is right. Farming is a business 
in which sound is important; animals betray pain or 
pleasure largely through sound; a poultryman is 
at a great disadvantage if he cannot hear the little 
ones. Then, too, some deaf persons crave the sight 
of their fellows; it is a pleasure to them to mingle 
silently with crowds; to see the multitudes pass by. 
The country—far from the rush and struggle of 
humans—actually terrorizes some deaf men. For 
myself, I greatly prefer the country, and I have 
selected fruit trees as my working companions. They 
talk the silent language, and they do not need to 
cry out when they wish to tell me that they need 
help. Yet, of course, we are better off if we mingle 
frequently with our fellows. 

Sometimes in public life or in crowds the right 


EXPERIMENTING WITH THE DEAF MAN 115 

tiling comes to us like an inspiration. There was a 
deaf man who went out to address a meeting of 
farmers. It was held in the open air, and a stiff 
wind blew straight from the ocean to the speaker’s 
stand. The meeting was important; the farmers 
were discouraged and discontented and had come to 
hear sound advice and fearless comment. A cau¬ 
tious politician gave them half an hour of unmiti¬ 
gated “hot air”—a collection of meaningless words 
and high-sounding phrases. Then a well-known 
scientist followed with what might appropriately 
be called “dry air.” The farmers disconsolately 
classified both addresses as “wind,” and enough of 
that was blowing from the ocean. Instinct told the 
deaf man that something was wrong, though he had 
sat patiently through the long speeches without hear¬ 
ing a word. When his turn came, he walked out of 
the wind into the shelter of a tree and began : 

“Job was the most afflicted man who ever lived. 
Of course, I know that there are men who claim that 
Job had a bed of roses compared with their constant 
afflictions. But Job has the advantage of good adver¬ 
tising in the Bible. He spoke a great truth when he 
said: 

“ ‘Can a man fill his belly with the east wind?’ ” 

A mighty roar of laughter from that audience 
startled the deaf man. Fortunately he had said just 
what was needed to explode the gloom and disap¬ 
pointment of that audience. 


CHAPTER VIII 


Companions in Trouble 

The Deaf in Social and Business Life—The Partially Deaf 
—Endeavors to “Get By”—The Yeas and the Nays—Fifty 
Cents or a Dollar?—The Safety of the Written Word—• 
The Indian and the Whisky—-The Boiling-down Process— 
The New Sense Developed by Affliction—The Deaf Cat 
and the Piano. 

During the years of expectancy, when we continue 
to look forward to a cure, we deaf generally try to 
deceive ourselves along with others by refusing to 
admit our condition, and by attempting to conceal 
the defect in conversation. Many people are more 
or less deaf in one ear; frequently they really do not 
realize the extent of their affliction. They go through 
strange performances in their efforts to hear. Have 
you ever seen a horse or a mule traveling with one 
ear bent forward and the other reversed? The 
animal is, no doubt, somewhat defective in hearing, 
and he “points” his ears front and back so as to catch 
all noises, particularly commands from the driver. 
Back in the earlier ages man also possessed this 
power of moving the ears; most of us have seen indi¬ 
viduals who still can control the muscles on the 
side of the head so that their ears “wiggle.” All 

116 


COMPANIONS IN TROUBLE 117 

of us still have these muscles, even if they have fallen 
out of use. Ear specialists say that many of us do 
actually move our ears slightly when making a 
great effort to catch the conversation. At any rate, 
human beings with defective hearing must bend for¬ 
ward, or even move about a circle of talkers to get 
in full range of the voices. We wonder sometimes 
why people insist upon getting on a certain side of 
their companions, and always walk on the inside of 
the street. Such a person is merely maneuvering to 
present the live side of his head. 

It is really very foolish for the deaf to attempt to 
conceal their affliction; it places us in a false 
position, and we are at an added disadvantage in 
society. We may hide our trouble for a time, but 
sooner or later we will be found out, and it is far 
wiser to be frank in the first place. Some of our 
misguided efforts to pose as full men have humorous 
results. We have various tricks of the trade which 
we at times employ to catch or hold conversation. 
One common plan is to lead the discussion along 
lines which will enable us to do most of the talking. 
It has been said of the deaf man that he either talks 
all the time or else says nothing, and that sometimes 
lie does both at once. Sometimes we meet a talker 
who is desperately determined to tell all of his own 
story—which is one involving many fatal direct 
Questions, such as “Am I right ?” “Do I make myself 


Il8 ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 

clear?” Then the deaf man is hopelessly lost, and 
the part of wisdom is to produce pencil and pad. 

A friend of mine who knew that he was going deaf 
conceived the brilliant scheme of saying “Yes,” or 
nodding his head to agree with everything that was 
said to him. He felt that the path of least resistance 
lies along the affirmative—in letting others always 
have the say. One day he settled himself in the first 
vacant chair in a barber shop, at the mercy of a very 
talkative barber, with whom expression of thought 
had become merely a vocal exercise. My friend knew 
that this man was talking and asking questions, but 
as he could hear nothing, he merely nodded at each 
evident interrogation point. He had some important 
work on hand which he was trying to develop, and, 
as is the habit of the deaf at such times, he became 
absorbed in his thought and quite unmindful of what 
the barber was doing. At each questioning look 
he emerged from his brown study only long enough 
to nod his head. Finally the barber finished, and 
presented a check for about three dollars. It then 
appeared that instead of asking the usual questions 
about the weather and business the man had been 
talking hair cut, singeing, facial massage, moustache 
curling, hair renewer, and all the rest. Delighted 
at such a model customer, the loquacious barber had 
done his full duty. Nothing but that special Provi¬ 
dence which guards fools and deaf men had saved 


COMPANIONS IN TROUBLE 119 

my friend from the bootblack, the vibrator and the 
manicure girl. 

I recently read in the daily paper of a lawsuit in 
which a man sued his barber to recover $4.75 ob¬ 
tained in just this way—the plaintiff being a deaf 
man. The justice decided against the barber on the 
ground that a man cannot legally be said to order a 
service unless he knows what it is going to be. So, 
score another for the deaf man. 

This and similar experiences convinced my deaf 
friend that the road to affirmation is well lined with 
a group of citizens who do far more than hold out 
their hats for charity. No deaf man is safe on that 
highway. So he changed his method and shook his 
head at all questions. He said that experience had 
convinced him that at best this is a selfish world, 
and most men approached him seeking some advan¬ 
tage rather than offering service; therefore a general 
negative was the best policy. Shortly after making 
this decision he attended a reception at a wealthy 
man’s country home. At one stage of the proceed¬ 
ings the men were all invited into a side room, where 
a very dignified butler marched about and whispered 
to each guest in turn. My friend ran true to form 
and shook his head. In a short time a fine drink was 
served to everyone except himself. 

As his affliction progresses, the deaf man learns 
frankly to admit his inability to hear. This turns 
out to be a remarkably effective way to separate the 


120 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


sheep from the goats, for most people will never go 
to the trouble of making us understand unless they 
have some really important message to deliver. 
Whenever we owe money, we find that our creditors 
are quite able to communicate with us; would that 
our debtors were equally insistent! Now and then 
comes a man who feels the tremendous importance 
of his message, although no one else recognizes it. 
He looks upon the deaf man as his select audience, 
and after giving us an agonizing half-hour, he goes 
on his way, pluming himself on the kindly deed he 
has performed in helping the neglected deaf man to 
valuable information! 

I once lived in a little Southern town where the 
man who kept the livery stable was quite deaf. He 
was popularly known as a “near” man, “so close you 
could see him.” “The only thing he could hear was 
the clink of money in his pocket.” The men who 
worked for him often had trouble getting their 
money. One day his stableman, Ben Adams, colored, 
approached the boss and screamed in his ear: 

“Mr. Brown, can I have fifty cents?” 

Brown heard him perfectly, but no one ever 
extracted fifty cents from him without working for 
it. So he put on a fierce look and roared: 

“What? What did you say?” 

Exceeding penury had made Ben Adams bold. Here 
was a chance to raise his demand, and the delay 


COMPANIONS IN TROUBLE 


121 


bolstered liis courage. So lie made a trumpet of his 
bauds and roared again: 

“Massa Brown, can I have a dollar f” 

Brown donned that fierce scowl which the deaf 
know so well how to assume, and roared himself: 

“I thought you said fifty cents!” 

The only safety for the very deaf man is to have 
the message written out. Lip-reading and the use of 
superior instruments are frequently very helpful, 
but my own experience is that it is a mistake to 
accept anything but written evidence. I take it that 
sound conversation is uncertain at best, and when 
a message is passed along through several persons, 
all more or less careless in speaking or listening, it 
it sure to be twisted out of its original shape. In 
our Southern printing office there was a stock anec¬ 
dote about the Indian who mixed up his message. 

This Indian was printer’s devil in a small news¬ 
paper office in Mississippi. He was said to be a star 
performer whenever he was supported by firewater. 
In those days local printers made their own ink roll¬ 
ers out of glue and molasses. During the Civil War 
the old roller wore out, and it became necessary to 
send the Indian to Vicksburg for the material for a 
new one. The printers did not dare write out the 
order, for if papers were found on the Indian he 
would be hung for a spy. So they coached him care¬ 
fully and told him to go on saying over and over 
to himself: 


122 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


“Something sticky and something sweet.” 

They felt that Vicksburg would understand this 
trade language, so they started him off with the 
money. The Indian made straight for Vicksburg 
through swamps and woods and across streams, ever 
repeating the mysterious message. On the last lap 
of his journey he fell and struck his head on a log 
with such force that he lay unconscious for a time. 
Finally he recovered, shook his scattered wits 
together and went on repeating the message. But 
it had been affected by the fall. Subjective audition 
may even have been responsible, but, at any rate, 
when he finally scrambled into the store at Vicks¬ 
burg and presented his money, he called for: 

“Something sweet and something to drink.” 

The merchant was well posted in this metaphor, 
so he fitted the Indian out with a jug of whiskey and 
five pounds of brown sugar. A day or two later 
the red man walked proudly into the printing office 
with this roller material. The printers were given 
to philosophy, and, being unable to make the ink 
roller, they proceeded to make a company of high 
rollers, in which task they were ably assisted by the 
faithful messenger. During the carouse a company 
of Grierson’s Union cavalry rode into town. All 
trades were represented in the Union army, and a 
couple of Northern printers used the printing outfit 
to good advantage. When the owners woke up they 


COMPANIONS IN TROUBLE 


123 


were put to work printing one of Lincoln’s procla¬ 
mations. 

By insisting upon written communications we 
deaf lose muck of the skim-milk of conversation, but 
we come to be expert in estimating tbe ability of 
our friends to express themselves in clear and simple 
English. Try it on a few of your visitors. You will 
be astonished to see bow many well-educated men 
will fail at tbe simple test of writing what they have 
to say quickly and tersely on paper. They flounder 
like schoolboys. My observation, as I look out from 
tbe silent world, is that with many humans talking 
becomes a sort of mechanical operation, usually 
involving no particular thought. It takes brains to 
put words on paper, and, again, the written word is 
actual evidence. A man speaking to you, and writ¬ 
ing to me, would probably give me tbe stronger and 
more reliable account—and work harder while doing 
it. I know a very pompous, dignified gentleman of 
tbe old school who would probably say to you: 

“The fateful hands upon the clock registered mid¬ 
night’s doleful hour before my head sought my pil¬ 
low.” 

Or, “The emotions generated by that pathetic 
occasion had such a profound effect upon me that I 
fell into a lachrymose condition.” 

If I handed him my pencil and pad he would get 
down to: 

“I went to bed at twelve. I wept.” 


124 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


Another bar to wordy discussions on paper is the 
fact that many well-informed people are not sure of 
their spelling. In this modern age too many busi¬ 
ness men depend upon their clerks and stenographers 
to see to such trifles as spelling and grammar; their 
own knowledge of the mechanics of expression grows 
dusty. One reason for the decline of the Roman 
Empire was that the soldiers became too lazy to 
carry their own weapons. They left them to slaves, 
and the slaves practiced with the implements of war 
until they became so expert that they overcame the 
masters. I think of this sometimes when a man who 
has nearly lost the art of writing through this trans¬ 
fer of the medium of expression from the hand to 
the mouth tries to communicate with me. Once I 
received a scathing reply to an excuse I made to a 
correspondent—that a sore throat had made it dif¬ 
ficult for me to dictate letters. He acidly inquired 
how long it had been since people wrote letters with 
the throat. 

Ignorant men who write little usually make the 
meaning evident, though the form cannot be called 
graceful. One night a drunken man drove into my 
yard by mistake. It was pitch dark, and I happened 
to be alone on the farm. His horses, eager for har¬ 
bor, had turned into our road. I went without a 
lantern (the family had taken it on their trip) to 
turn his horses about and start them down the high¬ 
way. Then he became possessed with a strong desire 


COMPANIONS IN TROUBLE 


125 


to tell me all his troubles. Of course, as I could not 
hear them, I made no reply, and my silence so 
enraged him that he wanted to fight. He clambered 
down from the wagon and groped about in the dark¬ 
ness to reach me. At last I made him understand 
that I could not hear, whereupon he was seized 
with a great grief for my trouble, and insisted on 
writing out his sentiments for me. There was no 
denying him, so off at one side of the buildings I 
started a little blaze of straw, and by its light he 
scrawled on a piece of writing paper with a blunt 
pencil. By the same flickering light I deciphered 
this: 

“1 am darn sorry. My brother cured his’n with 
skunk oil” 

Then he drove off singing, glad in his heart that 
he had offered consolation to an afflicted brother. 

My children have been interpreters for me from 
the time they were able to write. They can go with 
me on business trips and get the message which 
others frequently cannot deliver on paper. At first 
they found this hard and irksome, but it has proved 
remarkably good drill for them in English. They 
have come to be excellent reporters, with the ability 
to put the pith of long sentences and whole lectures 
into a few exact words. This exercise of giving the 
deaf man an accurate and brief account of the great 
volume of an ordinary conversation has really devel¬ 
oped their powers of expression. 


126 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


We of the silence know that but few words are 
needed to grasp the really essential things of life, 
and we often wonder why others lose so much time 
in the useless approach to a subject when we can 
often see through it by intuition. Probably one of 
the compensations of our affliction is that we actu¬ 
ally come to consider that these talkative, emotional 
people who surround us are abnormal. Two men 
with good ears meet for a business deal. They must 
go through the formula of discussing the weather, 
crops, or politics before they start at the real sub¬ 
ject. The whole discussion is useless and irrelevant, 
yet they both feel that in some way it is necessary, 
and even when they reach the point at issue, they 
seem to prolong the debate with useless formal 
details. The deaf man cannot do it that way. He 
must fully understand his side of the case before¬ 
hand, forego all preliminaries, and plunge right into 
the heart of the subject with as few words as pos¬ 
sible. Is this entirely a disadvantage? I think the 
man with perfect hearing might well learn from the 
deaf man whom he pities in this respect to cut out 
useless conversation and spend the extra time in 
thinking out his project. The most forceful and 
dependable men you know are not long talkers and 
elaborators. Their words are few and strong. 

While a philosopher may perhaps summon this 
sort of reasoning to his aid in the matter of conver¬ 
sation, he cannot apply it to music. Here the deaf 


COMPANIONS IN TROUBLE 


127 


are quite hopeless. I have little knowledge of music, 
and could never fairly distinguish one note from 
another. I have often wondered whether a real 
musician who has lost his hearing can obtain any 
comfort from reading music as we read poetry or 
history for consolation. Can a man hum over to 
himself some of the noble operas and obtain the sat¬ 
isfaction which comes to me from “Paradise Lost” 
or Shakespeare? No one seems to be able to tell of 
this; but of all the sorrowful people of the silent 
world, the saddest are the musicians, for sound was 
more than life to them. I read that Beethoven could 
muster no consolation when the silence finally fell 
upon him. Life had turned dark, with no hope of 
ligh t. 

I often sit with people who tell me that they are 
listening to delightful harmony of sound—music. 
My children grow up and learn to play and sing, but 
I do not hear them. When my boy plays his violin 
I get no more pleasure from it than I do from his 
sawing of a stick of wood—not so much, in fact, for 
I know that the wood will build up my fire and give 
me the light and heat which I can appreciate. It is 
absurd, and I smile to myself, but sometimes when 
others sit beside me with invisible fingers playing 
over their heartstrings at the wailing of the violin 
and the calm tones of the piano, my mind goes back 
to Lump, the white cat. 

There is a general belief that white cats are deaf. 


128 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


I know that some of them cannot hear, and Lump 
was one of the afflicted. I am bound to say that 
Lump endured his loss with great equanimity; he 
was more of a success than I ever was. He has given 
me more points on living happily in the silence than 
I ever obtained from any human being. He forgot 
the drawbacks and enlarged the advantages. Lump 
was never strikingly popular with my wife. She 
would not have cats in the house, and, her hearing 
being good, she could not appreciate the philosophy 
of this particular specimen. The proper place for 
cats, in her mind, was the barn, where they may per¬ 
form their life duty of demolishing rats and mice. 
There are some humans who, like Lump, are forced 
into ignoble service when they are really capable of 
giving instruction in psychology. 

Long before my time men have been forced to meet 
their boon companions under cover of darkness, or 
they have had to make private arrangements for a 
rendezvous with the “guide, philosopher and friend.” 
So, sometimes at night, after the rest of the family 
had retired, I would open the back door. There 
always was Lump, curled on the mat, ready to share 
my fire. Many a time as I let him in I have taken 
down a familiar old book from its shelf and read 
Thackeray’s poem: 

“So each shall mourn, in life’s advance, 

Dear hopes dear friends untimely killed; 


COMPANIONS IN TROUBLE 


129 


Shall grieve for many a forfeit chance, 

And longing passion unfulfilled. 

Amen! Whatever fate be sent, 

Pray God the heart may kindly glow, 

Although the head with care be bent, 

And whitened with the Winter’s snow. 

“Come wealth or want, come good or ill, 

Let old and young accept their part, 

And bow before the awful will; 

And hear it with an honest heart, 

Who misses or who wins the prize. 

Go; lose or conquer as you can, 

And if you fail, or if you rise, 

Be each, pray God, a gentleman!” 

And Lump would sit at the other side of the fire, 
turn his wise head to one side, and look over at me 
as if to say: 

“Old fellow, we are two of a kind—a rejected kind. 
They pity us for our misfortune; let’s make them 
envy us for our advantages. I know more of the 
habits of rats and mice than any cat in this neigh¬ 
borhood, because I have been forced to study them. 
1 have made new ears out of my eyes and nose and 
brain, and so developed a new sense—instinct, which 
i c worth far more than their hearing. Why can’t 
you do the same with men?” 

Those were great nights with Lump before my 
fire, and we both understood that when the interview 
was over he was to go outside. One night, however, 
I forgot this, and as I went sleepily off to bed he 



130 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


• stayed curled up by the warm hearth. The dreams 
of a deaf man are usually vivid and emphatic. Sleep 
may be your time for rest and relief from noise; with 
us it may be our period of music and excitement. 
That night I dreamed that I was engaged in a prize¬ 
fight. I had given the other man a knockout blow, 
when suddenly the referee came up from behind and 
struck me on the side with such force that my ribs 
all seemed to give way. I “came to” to find an ener¬ 
getic figure sitting up in bed beside me, and pound¬ 
ing my side in an effort to bring me back to assume, 
my true position as defender of the family. Around 
the bed were grouped several small white figures, 
and at last they made me understand. 

“There’s someone downstairs. He’s robbing the 
house. We can hear him. Go down and see about 
it!” 

“What’s he doing?” 

“Playing the piano.” 

I will admit that my experience with burglars is 
somewhat limited, but I had never heard of one who 
stopped to play the piano before starting to burgle. 
Only a very desperate character would be likely to 
do that. There have been numerous cases where a 
deaf man has been shot down when approaching a 
house at night. He may have come on the most 
innocent errand, but as he could not hear the com¬ 
mand, “Speak or I’ll fire!” he kept steadily on and 
was shot. I remembered these incidents, but could 


COMPANIONS IN TROUBLE 131 

not recall any instance where the (leaf man was sup¬ 
posed to give the order. But I had been telling my 
children great stories of life on the plains, and the 
only way for me to remain a hero was to tackle the 
intruder. I took my big stick and started down, 
while my wife brought a lamp and held it at the top 
of the stairs. I presume she was handing out some 
very sensible advice as I descended—but I could not 
hear it. 

Now, what would you do and what would you say 
if you were roused at night, led by your family into 
a conflict, only to find an old and trusted friend 
robbing the henroost? I probably felt all your emo¬ 
tions when I caught sight of that robber. The piano 
had been left open, and there, walking up and down 
the keyboard impartially on black and white was 
my old friend Lump—the deaf cat. He was taking 
advantage of a night in the house to go on a voyage 
of exploration. His jump on to the piano led to 
my disgrace. The “robber” was quickly flung into 
outer darkness by an indignant woman, and prob¬ 
ably I escaped a plain recital of my shortcomings 
only by lack of hearing. Do you know, while I would 
congratulate the husband on his escape, I always 
feel sorry for the lady, who would be well justified 
in giving her man a full lecture, and yet knows that 
he would not hear it. However, I feel that some 
innocent member of the family may receive the 
impact of these remarks. At any rate, before we 


132 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


were settled tlie baby woke up. It certainly was one 
of those rare occasions when the deaf man appre¬ 
ciates his advantages enthusiastically. 

But why did Lump, in spite of his usual good 
sense, decide to try the piano at midnight? Of 
course, he did not know he was making a noise; but 
why mount the piano? I puzzled over this, and the 
wise old cat looked at me pityingly; but I could not 
understand. Every time he could slip into the house 
he went straight to the piano for a promenade up 
and down the keys. I began to think that we had 
developed a wonderful ‘‘musical cat.” 

Some time later the piano seemed to need tuning, 
and a tuner came to take the muffle and twang out 
of its strings. When he opened up the front, the 
mystery of the musical cat was revealed. Just 
behind the keys, inside, was the nest of a mouse; she 
had carried in a handful of soft material—and in it 
were half a dozen baby mice. Lump had not been 
attempting ‘‘Home, Sweet Home”; his thought had 
been more nearly along the line of “Thou Art So 
Near, and Yet So Far.” He had no ear for music, 
but he had a nose for mice, and he had demonstrated 
his knowledge of the habits of mice. I, too, have 
found it wiser to judge people by their habits rather 
than by their music, for there are many who would 
be willing to play “Home, Sweet Home” while in 
reality they are after the mice. 


CHAPTER IX 


The Approach to Silence 

Tlie Approach of Deafness—The College Woman—Student 
Methods in General—Calamity and Courage—Animals 
and Thought Communication—Another Compensation—* 
Pronunciation and the Defensive Campaign. 

Some years ago we planted a hedge at the end of 
my lawn. For years I could sit at the dining-table 
and look over it. At night I saw my neighbor’s 
window-light, and by day I could see him or some 
of his family moving about the house or the fields. 
As the years went on I became aware that the hedge 
was growing. Finally there came a Spring when 
the bushes were filled out with foliage so that all 
view of the neighbor’s house was lost. I could not 
see the light at night. While I knew the people were 
moving about during the daytime, I could not see 
them. The hedge had shut me away from them, 
yet it had grown so slowly and so gently that there 
was no shock. Had my neighbor shut himself sud¬ 
denly away from view by building a spite fence, the 
loss would have been far greater. This instance 
somewhat resembles the difference between sudden 
loss of hearing and its slow fading away. 

I know of the curious case of a woman who could 

133 


134 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


not be made to realize that her hearing was going 
until the common tests of everyday life convinced 
her that she was going deaf. What are these com¬ 
mon tests? The usual ones are inability to hear the 
clocks and the birds. Very likely you have been in 
the habit of listening to the clock at night when for 
some reason sleep was impossible. It has been a com¬ 
fort to you to think how this constant old friend 
goes calmly on through sun or storm, through joy 
or sorrow, gathering up the dust of the seconds into 
the grains of the minutes, and forming them into 
bricks of the hours and days. Or you may have been 
alone in the house on a Winter’s night. You heard 
the house timbers crack, and gentle fingers seemed 
to be tapping on the window pane. Then there came 
a night when you lay awake and missed the sound 
of your old friend, who seemed to have stopped 
checking off the marching hours. Many a deaf per¬ 
son waking in the night, missing the sound of the 
clock, has risen from bed and brought a light to start 
the old timepiece going. Not one of you can realize 
what it means when the light falls upon the face of 
the clock, revealing the minute hand still cheerfully 
circling its appointed course. The clock is still going, 
but something else has stopped. 

We have endured another test in watching the 
birds. Most of us can remember when the morning 
was full of bird music. One day as we walk about 
it comes suddenly home to us that the birds are 


THE APPROACH TO SILENCE 


135 


silent 01 * have disappeared. At least, we can no 
longer hear them. We look about and notice a robin 
on the lawn. We see him throw back his head, open 
his mouth and move his throat. He is evidently 
singing—but we did not know it. I cannot tell you 
in ordinary language how a chill suddenly passes 
over the heart as we realize that as long as life lasts 
music is to become to us as unsubstantial as the 
shadow of a cloud passing over the lawn. 

The woman I speak of knew by these tests that 
her hearing was failing. She was a student at col¬ 
lege, where quick and sound ears are essential if one 
is to obtain full benefit from lectures. I know just 
what this means from my own experience, since I 
entered college some little time after my ears began 
to fail. I am frequently asked how it is possible 
for students with defective hearing to obtain an 
education. To the ambitious man or woman the 
first thought on discovering the beginnings of deaf¬ 
ness is that the mind must be improved so as to make 
skilled labor possible. Too many deaf people after 
a brief struggle feel that fate has denied them the 
right to an education, and they give up trying in 
despair. I found several ways of partly overcoming 
the difficulty. I copied notes made by another 
student. In every class you will find several natural 
reporters who make a very clear synopsis of the 
lectures, and are rather proud of their skill. I 
found one lazy and brilliant fellow who was an 


136 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


excellent reporter, though he absolutely refused to 
study. He would give me his report and I would 
look up the authorities and help him fill in the skele¬ 
ton. We served each other like the blind and the 
halt. I also made arrangements with several pro¬ 
fessors to read their lecture notes. Most of them 
are quite willing to permit this when they find the 
deaf man earnest and determined. In fact, the 
average professor comes to be a dry sawbones of a 
fact dispenser, whose daily struggle is to cram these 
facts into the more or less unwilling student brain. 
When an interested deaf man appears, actually eager 
to read the lectures, the soul of the driest professor 
will expand, for here, he thinks, is full evidence of 
appreciation. The world and the units which com¬ 
prise it have always admired determination, or what 
plain people call “grit ” I think it has been given 
that name because it is that substance which the 
fighter may throw into the works of the machine 
which would otherwise roll over him. 

Working thus, I came to know something of the 
inner life of these professors, whose daily routine 
comes to be a struggle with untrained minds which 
resent all efforts to harness them. The attitude of 
the average student in the class-room, as I recall it, 
reminds me of our trotting colt, Beauty. She was 
so full of trotting blood that at times it boiled over 
into a desire for a mad run. We thought we had a 
vorld-beater, but when we put her on the track she 


THE APPROACH TO SILENCE 


137 


could barely shade four minutes. An experienced 
trainer took her in hand, put foot-weights and straps 
on her and forced her to change her gait and concen¬ 
trate her power. How that beautiful little horse did 
rage and chafe at this indignity! One could imagine 
her protest. 

“Let me be free! Do I not know how to pick up 
my feet and use my limbs for speed ? My father was 
a king of speed—my mother of royal blood! Set me 
free! Nature has given me natural swiftness—I do 
not need your art! 

But they held poor Beauty to it, though she 
chafed and lathered, and tried to throw herself 
down. Everywhere she met the weights, the straps 
and the cruel whip. At last she submitted to disci¬ 
pline and did as she was told. She clipped fully 
ninety seconds from her natural speed for a mile, 
but while she was forced to obey she had little re¬ 
spect for her trainer. 

Could my college professors have controlled their 
human colts with weights, straps and whips, it is 
more than likely that education would have estab¬ 
lished a new record. I found my teachers quite will¬ 
ing to give the list of references from which their 
lectures were taken, and with these in hand the deaf 
student may read in advance of his class and be 
fully prepared. As a rule, he does not stand high 
in recitations, but excels in his written work. The 
truth is that for work which requires study and 


138 ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 

research, deafness is something of an advantage. It 
enables a student fully to concentrate his mind on 
the subject. It seems to me that most of the world’s 
imperishable thoughts have been born in the silence, 
or, at least, in solitude. The fact is that the human 
ear, for all the joy, comfort or power it may give, is 
at best a treacherous and undependable organ. Per¬ 
haps I cannot be classed as an authority on a subject 
which involves accurate hearing, but I know that 
the greatest danger in my business is that we are 
sometimes forced to rely upon spoken or hearsay 
evidence. I will not use statements in print until 
they are written out and signed. Too many people 
depend for their facts upon what others tell them. 
The brain may distort the message and memory may 
blur it. The wise deaf man learns to discount 
spoken testimony, and will act only upon printed 
or written words. I have had people come to me 
fully primed for an hour’s talk of complaint or 
scandal; I hand them a pad of paper and a pencil, 
settle back and say: 

“Now tell me all about it.” 

That pen or pencil is usually as efficient as a milk- 
tester in determining the surprisingly small amount 
of fat which exists in the milk of ordinary conversa¬ 
tion 

You see, as I told you I should be likely to do, 
1 have wandered away from the text. That is char¬ 
acteristic of the deaf, for we seldom hear the text, 


THE APPROACH TO SILENCE 


139 


anyway. The woman 1 started to tell about managed 
to work through college and began treatment for 
her deafness. This promised some relief, when sud¬ 
denly the great earthquake shook San Francisco. 
The shock and fright of that catastrophe destroyed 
her hearing entirely. I have heard of several cases 
where deafness came like this, in a flash. As one 
man repeated to me: 

“At twenty-nine minutes past ten I actually heard 
c pin drop on the floor of my room. At half-past ten 
it would have been necessary to prick me to let me 
know that the pin was there.” 

And this woman’s mother died. Her daughter 
was forced to sit beside her at the last, unable to 
hear the message which the mother, just passing into 
the unseen country, tried to give. In all the book of 
time, I suppose there is recorded no more terrifying 
sadness than the fact of this inability to hear the 
parting words. Sometimes I regret that I promised 
not to make this book a tale of woe, for what could 
I not tell, if I would, of the soul-destroying sadness 
of this longing to hear a whispered confidence? 

The woman of whom I speak did not shrivel under 
the heat of calamity. She continued treatment, and 
has made some slight gain in hearing. And now 
she has qualified as an expert physician. People 
wonder how a deaf person can possibly diagnose 
organic diseases, such as heart trouble, or even 
pneumonia. They can do it, for I have known sev- 


140 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


eral very deaf physicians who yet have met with 
marked success. One in particular was for years 
a chief examiner for a large insurance company. 
There was something almost uncanny about the way 
this man could look into the human body and put 
his finger upon any weak spot. I finally decided 
that he had developed as a substitute for hearing a 
hidden powder to record with the eye and mind the 
symptoms not visible to most of his profession. The 
others depended on man-made charts and rules. 
Their perfect ears had made them slaves to common 
practice. My deaf friend, deprived of the ordinary 
avenue of approach for consultation, had pushed off 
like a pioneer into the unknown, where he had found 
tfie mysterious power. 

I am well aware that I am getting out where the 
water is deep and that many of you are not prepared 
to swim with me. But there are some very strange 
things happening in the silent world. Have you 
ever noticed two deaf people trying to communicate? 
Strange as the process may appear, they are able 
to make each other understand, and they do it quite 
easily, where a person with good ears would have 
great trouble. I feel convinced that this century 
will see a system of wordless thought communica¬ 
tion worked out, though its beginnings may be crude. 
It will be developed first by the afflicted, chiefly by 
the deaf. I am sure that you have noticed, as I have, 
how the so-called dumb animals can communicate. 


THE APPROACH TO SILENCE I4I 

Let us take a group of horses at pasture. Now that 
gasoline has so largely superseded oats as motive 
force on our farms, younger people may not fully 
understand, but most people of middle age will 
remember how old Dick and Kate and all the rest 
went to a service of grass on Sunday. Perhaps they 
were scattered all over the field. Suddenly Dick, the 
galled old veteran off by his fence corner, raised his 
head and considered for a moment. Near by were 
old Sport and Kate, feeding side by side as they have 
worked in the harness for years. Soon old Dick 
walked meditatively up to this pair. He halted 
beside them and they stopped feeding for a moment, 
apparently to listen. The old horse stayed with them 
for a time and then walked slowly about the field to 
the others. No audible sound was made, but finally, 
one by one, the horses all stopped feeding and fol-. 
lowed their leader up to the shadow of the big tree. 
The gray mare and her foal were the last to go. 
There in the shade the horses stood for some time 
with their heads together. Evidently some soundless 
discussion was taking place. At one point the gray 
mare threatened to kick old Dick, but she was pre¬ 
vented by big Tom, who seemed to be sergeant-at- 
arms. After a time they separated, and each went 
back to the spot where he was feeding. Who does 
not know that there has been a convention at which 
these horses have agreed upon some definite line of 
conduct? They may have organized a barnyard 


142 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


strike or mutiny. Dick and Kate may refuse to 
pull at the plow. Perhaps the council agreed to let 
certain parts of the pasture grow up to fresh grass. 
We saw the colt chasing the sheep back to the hill. 
No doubt he had been appointed a committee of 
one to do this, since the sheep nibble too close to 
allow an honest horse a good mouthful. At any rate, 
through some power which humans do not possess, 
these animals are able to communicate, and to make 
their wants known. I presume that originally man 
possessed something of this strange power. As he 
developed audible language he let the ability fall 
into disuse. The Indians and some savages have 
retained much of it. I take it that the deaf, shut 

away from much of ordinary conversation, redevelop 

». • 

^something of this power. 

Kipling brings this idea out well iu some of his 
Vermont stories. The farmer goes on Sunday after¬ 
noon to salt the -Morses in the back pasture, where 
the boarding horses are feeding. These boarders rep¬ 
resent a strange mixture. There are “sore” truck 
horses from the city, family nags on vacation, and 
old veterans whose days of usefulness are ended. 
With this mixed company, bringing in all the tricks 
of the city, are the sober work horses of the farm. 
The farmer puts his salt on the rocks where the 
horses can lick it, and then sits down to look over 
the rolling country. Several of these city boarders 


THE APPROACH TO SILENCE 


143 


are of the “tough” element, and they attempt to 
stir up a mutiny. 

“See,” they say as they lick the salt, “now w T e have 
him. He does not suspect us. We can creep up 
behind him, kick him off that rock and trample him.” 

But the farm horses object. This man has treated 
them well, and they will fight for him, and the toughs 
are awed. I have spent much time watching farm 
animals at silent communication, and I have come 
to believe that Kipling’s story may be partly true. 
I have seen our big Airedale, Bruce, sit with his head 
at one side watching the children at play on the 
lawn. He will walk off to where the other dogs are, 
and evidently tell them about it, glancing at the 
children as he does so. 

Some men are able to talk with their eyebrows 
or their shoulders or their hands so that they are 
easily understood. I talked with an Italian once 
through an interpreter. This man was a fruit¬ 
grower, and my friend explained to him that I was 
growing peaches without cultivating the soil, just 
cutting the grass and weeds and letting them lie on 
the top of the ground. The Italian regarded this as 
rank heresy, and he evidently regretted his inability 
to express himself in English. He did give a curious 
long shrug to his shoulders, he spread out his hands, 
rolled his eyes and spat on the ground. HeNcould 
not possibly have expressed his disapproval more 
eloquently, and I understood his feelings far better 


144 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


than I did those of the learned professor who elab¬ 
orated a complicated theory for growing peaches. 

All intelligent deaf men will tell you that they 
know something of this subtle power. Edison is very 
deaf, and I am not surprised to learn that he is 
studying it, attempting to organize it. It is one of 
the interesting mysteries of the silent world, and it 
can be made into a great healing compensation for 
one who will view his affliction with philosophy, 
concentrating his mind upon its study. 

While, of course, I could make a long catalogue 
of the compensations and advantages of deafness, 
we must all admit that there is another side. For 
instance, the man of the silent world must avoid the 
pitfall of pronunciation. When sound is lost he for¬ 
gets how words are pronounced, and the new words 
and phrases constantly entering the language are 
mysterious stumbling blocks. For example, no sen¬ 
sible deaf man will mention the name of that Russian 
society, the epithet now so glibly applied by con¬ 
servatives to all who show radical tendencies. Nor 
would he attempt to put tongue to the hideous names 
of some of the new European States, or even to the 
name of McKinley’s assassin. He lets someone else 
attempt those, some reckless person with good ears. 
A strange thing about it is that our friends do not 
understand our limitations in this respect. My wife 
ought to know most of the restrictions and tricks of 
the deaf. Yet she was quite surprised when I hesi- 


THE APPROACH TO SILENCE 


145 


fated about reading a church lecture without a 
rehearsal. It was a canned lecture, where you pro¬ 
cure the slides and the manuscript, and select some 
well-voiced “home talent” to read it. I was chosen 
as the “talent,” but I remembered how years before 
I upset a sober-minded group by twisting up “Beelze¬ 
bub.” Therefore, I wanted to read the lecture over 
several times and practice on some of the hard Bible 
names. Suppose I ran unexpectedly on those men 
who went down into the fiery furnace. Every child 
in the Sunday school could reel them off perfectly, 
but I had not heard of them for years, and I defy 
any one to get them right at sight. 

Let the wise deaf man stick to the words he knows 
about until he has practiced the new ones to the 
satisfaction of his wife and daughter. He may well 
put up a defensive fight in most of his battles. Let 
him be sure of his facts, sure that he is right, and 
then stand his ground. Let others do the advancing 
and the countering and play the part of Napoleon 
generally; the deaf man will do better to “stand 
pat.” 

“But when was there ever a successful defensive 
campaign ?” 

I advise you to get out your history and read of 
the Norman conquest. The battle of Hastings 
decided that. The Saxons lost that battle by refus¬ 
ing to “stand pat.” They ran out of their strong¬ 
hold and were divided and destroyed. Had they 


146 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


taken my advice to deaf men, the history of England 
would have been bound in blond leather instead of 
black! That might have made considerable differ¬ 
ence to you and me. I think I may say without fear 
of contradiction that the deaf invite most of their 
troubles by running out after them; when if we 
would keep within our own defenses and stand our 
ground we might avoid them. 


CHAPTER X 


Mixing Word Meanings 

Misunderstandings and Half-meanings—The Lazy Vocalists 
—The Minister and the Chicken Pie—Reconciling the 
Deaf Old Couple—When One Book Agent Received a Wel¬ 
come—Putting the “Sick” in “Music.” 

The average man does not begin to realize how 
sadly he has neglected the training of his vocal 
organs. I have known men who have less than half 
the articulation of a bullfrog to blame people with 
dull hearing because they cannot understand the 
muffled mouthings and lazy vocalisms. Here we 
deaf have a real grievance. There ought to be a 
world where the blame and the ridicule for a failure 
to hear would go to the talker rather than to the 
listener. The mouth is more often at fault than the 
ears, although society will not have it so. There are 
people who run their words together like beads 
crowded on a string. Others talk as though their 
mouths were made for eating entirely, and were 
constantly employed for that purpose. “His mouth 
is full of hot hasty pudd’n,” is the way my deaf 
aunt would put it—and she was right in more ways 
than one, for usually these mumblers and mouthers 
come with a foolish or useless message, though they 
may consider it of the highest importance. Others 

147 


148 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


seem to consider it bad form to talk loud enough for 
the ordinary ear to catch the sounds. I frequently 
wonder if people with such featureless voices realize 
how they are regarded by those who are approaching 
the silence. They seem to me persons who have hid¬ 
den a priceless talent—not in the earth like the 
unfaithful servant of the parable, but in their chests, 
like a miser. It seems to me a crime to turn what 
might become a flute or a silver-toned cornet into a 
whimpering bellows or a cracked tin horn. I would 
have every child trained in some form of elocution 
or music; such lessons would be far more useful to 
the world than much of the geography and so-called 
science now taught in our schools. Many blunders 
can be traced to the mumblers and lazy-voiced 
talkers. 

Some of our commonest and most amusing mis¬ 
haps are caused by our getting only a word here and 
there in a conversation—and it often happens that ' 
we seize upon something unimportant in a sentence 
and dress it up grotesquely with our own ideas of 
what the speaker is trying to convey. This is bad 
business, I know, but many people show such impa¬ 
tience when we ask for repetitions that we prefer to 
take chances. 

I remember one farm family consisting years ago 
of a very deaf and dominating woman, her mild and 
well-drilled husband, and the boy they were “bring¬ 
ing up.” The woman mastered the household, partly 


MIXING WORD MEANINGS 


149 


because it was her nature to rule, and partly because 
it was impossible to argue with her. She never heard 
any opposing opinions. The evidence was always all 
one way—her way. The dominant or self-assertive 
deaf are the greatest tyrants on earth; those who 
are not self-assertive are usually bossed and put 
aside. In this family the deaf man and the boy well 
knew how to keep to their places. There was some¬ 
thing calculated to make you shiver in the almost 
uncanny way the deaf woman would catch that boy 
at his tricks. Every now and then she would stand 
him up in a corner, point a long, bony finger at him 
and demand: 

“Boy, are you doing right?” 

As he was usually meditating some bit of mischief, 
this constant appeal to conscience kept him well 
under subjection. 

One cold day in early Spring the man and the 
boy were sorting potatoes down cellar. That is a 
hungry job, and they were poorly fortified by a light 
breakfast. The old man had cut a piece from the 
salt fish which hung from a nail and divided it with 
the boy, but he truthfully said it was not very “fill¬ 
ing.” However, it made them thirsty, so in a few 
minutes the man went up to the kitchen for a drink 
of water, and also for the purpose of considering 
the prospects for dinner. His wife sat by the stove 
reading her Bible, and he came up close to her. 

“What ye goin’ ter have for dinner?” 


150 ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 

“Who’s goin’ ter be here?” 

“Nobody but the boy.” 

In those days the line-up at the dinner table made 
considerable difference to the housekeeper. A 
“picked-up dinner” was ample for the family, but 
special guests meant more elaborate fare. The lady 
had listened attentively and had caught the sound of 
just one word—“boy.” She used that for the foun¬ 
dation of the sentence, and let imagination do the 
rest. So she gave her husband credit for saying: 

“The Reverend Mr. Joy.” 

Now this Mr. Joy was the minister. There was 
little about him to suggest his name, but those were 
the good old days when “the cloth” was entitled to a 
full yard of respect—and received it. In these days 
a woman may gain fame by writing a book, running 
for office or appearing in some spectacular divorce 
case; but these are commonplace affairs compared 
with the old-time excitement of entertaining the min¬ 
ister and having him praise the dinner. If the Rev. 
Mr. Joy was to be her guest, the farm must shake 
itself to provide a full meal. So the deaf lady has¬ 
tened at once into action; she put her book aside, 
shook up the fire vigorously, and meanwhile acquired 
a program. 

“In that case we’ll have chicken pie!” 

The man and the boy went out and ran down the 
old Brahma rooster. They finally cornered him by 
the fence, where the old gentleman fell on him and 


MIXING WORD MEANINGS 151 

pinned him to the ground. Then they cut off his 
head, plunged him into hot water, and the boy 
picked him, having stepped into a grain sack, which 
served as an apron. That rooster had the reputation 
of being old enough to vote, but those New England 
housekeepers well knew how to put such a tough 
old customer into the pot and take him out as tender 
as a broiler. 

It was not until that chicken pie was on the table 
that the old lady finally understood that she had 
exerted herself for the boy and not for the minister. 
But again she rose at once to the occasion. That pie 
was too rich for her plain family, so she carefully 
put it away in the pantry and fed her husband and 
the boy on remnants. These consisted of scrapings 
from the bean-pot, one fish ball, boiled turnips and 
one “Taunton turkey,” which was the fashionable 
name for smoked herring . The pie was held for next 
day, when the reverend was actually invited, and he 
came. 

It may have been your pleasant privilege to see 
a hungry minister, whose lines are cast in a com¬ 
munity where thrift marches a little ahead of charity 
in the social parade, get within a few feet of a genu¬ 
ine New England chicken pie. If you have not 
experienced this, you do not know the real meaning 
of eloquent anticipation. Mr. Joy was hungry, and 
old Brahma had certainly acquired the tenderness 
of youth. The minister had had two helps and 


i 52 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


wanted another; he saw a fine piece of breast meat 
right at the edge of the crust. It was an occasion 
for diplomacy, for well he knew that the lady was 
planning to save enough of that pie for the Sunday 
dinner. He cleared his throat and put his best pulpit 
voice into the announcement: 

“Mrs. Reed, this is an excellent pie!” 

This compliment did not quite carry across the 
table. 

“What say?” 

Very slowly and distinctly did Mr. Joy repeat his 
compliment in shorter words. 

“This hen is a great success ” 

The lady got part of that sentence. She was sure 
of “hen” and “great success.” It happened that her 
nephew, Henry, was a student at the theological sem¬ 
inary, and had delivered a strong sermon in the local 
church shortly before. Naturally she thought the 
“hen” referred to him, particularly as anyone ought 
to have known that the pie had been made from an 
old rooster. So, with a pleasant smile she acknowl¬ 
edged the compliment, coming as near to the target 
as the deaf generally do: 

“Yes, I always said that Henry was best fitted 
of all our flock to enter the ministry .” 

The Reverend Mr. Joy put his head on one side 
and let this remark thoroughly soak into his mind. 
Then he silently passed his plate for that piece of 


MIXING WORD MEANINGS 


153 


white meat, as he should have done before. Action 
is far more emphatic than words to the deaf. 

Then there were the two old people who had be¬ 
come estranged. Both were very deaf, without imag¬ 
ination, and very stubborn. They quarreled over 
some trivial misunderstanding, and refused to speak 
to each other; for years they had lived in the same 
house, with never a word passing between them. 
Probably the original trouble was due to a misunder¬ 
standing of words, but when the deaf are obstinate 
and “set in their ways,” you have the human mind 
like an oyster depositing a thick shell of prejudice 
around the germ of charity and good nature. This 
is one reason why they of all people should contin¬ 
uously read good poetry and stories of human 
nature; this is their best chance for keeping in touch 
with common humanity, and if a man lose the con¬ 
tact he is no longer a full man. 

So these old people lived together and yet never 
addressed each other. There was one ear trumpet 
between them, and they always waited for visitors 
to come before trying to communicate. They had 
been known to call in some stranger who chanced 
to be passing in order that he might act as intermedi¬ 
ary. In truth, the old couple still loved each other 
in an odd, clumsy fashion, and both would gladly 
have broken the silence had not the pride of each 
refused to “give way.” 

One day the neighbor's boy came to borrow some 


154 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


milk, and both seized upon him to act as interpreter. 
He screamed an explanation of his errand to the 
old lady. 

“Pa tried to milk old Spot, and she kicked him 
and the pail over. Ma wants to borry some milk to 
feed the baby.” 

“Tell him to get the pan off the pantry shelf.” 

The boy delivered the message and the old man 
got the milk. 

“Tell her I want my dinner.” 

The boy did his best to scream this into the lady’s 
ear, but his feeble voice cracked under the strain. 
The listener got only one clear sound. 

“Says he’s a miserable sinner, does he? You’re 
right; he is. I’m glad to see he’s getting humble. 
Tell him I’m waiting for dry wood. If I don’t get 
it, I’ll raise Cain!” 

The boy ran over to the man with this message. 
Hie part about the wood was easy for there was the 
empty wood box. The rest of the message was too 
dull for his ears. So he hunted up pencil and paper 
and told the boy to write it out, while his wife sat 
congratulating herself with : 

“Well, I may be kinda deaf; but I ain’t so bad 
as he is.” 

After a protracted struggle with the pencil, the 
boy produced : 

“She says she’ll give you cane.” 

“A gold-headed cane. Just what I wanted! ’Pears 


MIXING WORD MEANINGS 


155 


to me Aunt Mary’s getting ready to admit she was 
wrong. You tell her I knew she’d smart for it!” 

The boy went faithfully back across the room and 
screamed the message, which she understood to be: 

“He knew you’re awful smart!” 

There was no question about the pleasure this 
gave her, but when was any woman of spirit easily 
won? She could not give way so quickly. 

“You just tell him to keep his soft soap for wash¬ 
ing days!” 

The boy again did his best, but the old man only 
heard “soap” and “days,” and happily, imagination 
came to his aid and framed: 

“I hope for happy days!” 

The old man looked at his wife for a moment, and 
there was a mighty struggle in his mind. Finally 
he hunted for their community ear trumpet, and 
marched across the room to her side. At great cost 
of pride he put the tube of the trumpet to her ear 
and shouted: 

“I’d like to make it happy days, Mary; and I kinda 
think I was part wrong. Anyway, here I be speak¬ 
ing first.” 

Aunt Mary took her turn at the trumpet. 

“Reuben, I’m awful glad you spoke first. Think¬ 
ing it over, I guess I was a little to blame, too, but 
not half as much as you were!” 

And Reuben saw visions of his old courting days, 
when they could both hear whispered confidences, 


156 ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 

when this gray and wrinkled woman was a blooming 
girl. And the old man rose to heights of wild extrav¬ 
agance. 

“Here, boy,” he said, “I’ll give you ten cents to go 
out to the shed and split an armful of that soft pine.” 

And after the door closed behind him—well, there 
is a human language which needs no words for its 
interpretation; it is action. 

It is no wonder that when the boy returned Aunt 
Mary was so flustered that instead of filling the pail 
with the skim-milk, she poured in fine cream! That 
baby had a full supply of vitamines for once. 

I am acquainted with a young man who once went 
out into a country neighborhood to canvass for a sub¬ 
scription book. This man was somewhat deaf, just 
enough to make him mix words a little. Of course, 
he had no business to serve as a book agent, but the 
deaf will sometimes attempt strange things. He 
stopped at one farmhouse and found a middle-aged 
man and woman in the sitting-room. The man was 
evidently annoyed and embarrassed by the book 
agent’s entrance, but the latter paid little attention. 
He ran glibly through his story twice, and finished 
as usual, handing his pencil over with his usual 
persuasive: 

“Sign right here, on this dotted line.” 

“Not on your life,” was the man’s response; but 
the agent heard only one word distinctly, and got 
that wrong. He understood: 


MIXING WORD MEANINGS 


157 


“Talk to my wife,” and, being on the lookout for 
any encouragement, he proceeded to do this in his 
best style. 

“Why, madam, think for a moment what it will 
mean to have this beautiful book on your center 
table. When your husband here comes in from his 
work it will entertain him and give him a kindly 
regard for his family. And, madam, consider your 
children. When they come to the age of maturity 
with such parents—” But that was as far as he 
could go, for the woman dropped her work, screamed 
and ran from the room, leaving the book agent com¬ 
pletely mystified over what he had said to start such 
a scene. The man glanced at him for a moment, and 
then snorted with satisfaction. He rose and started 
after the woman, only halting in the doorway to say: 

“IBs a good idea, all right. You wait here until 
I come back.” 

Moments like these test the temper of the deaf 
man’s steel. He had evidently stirred up a violent 
tumult, but he has no idea what it is about and when 
or where it will boil over. The troubled agent sat 
by the window and looked out at a savage bulldog 
which had come from behind the house and was now 
waiting in the path with something like a sneer on 
his brutal face, expressing: 

“Here I am, on duty. Come and get yours! I 
need a new toothbrush, and your coat is just what 
T have been looking for.” 


158 ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 

J 

And then back came the man, smiling like a May 
morning. 

“Here, let me have the book. I’ll take two copies. 
Never had anything do me so much good. Why, si r , 
I’ve been courting that fine woman for ten years, 
and neither one of us could ever get up to the point, 
leap year or any other. Then you come along and 
make that break about calling her my wife. That 
did the business, sure—pushed us right into the 
river. I just chased right after her and caught her 
in the kitchen. ‘Ain’t it the truth?’ says I. ‘And if 
it ain’t, let’s make it so.’ And all she said was: ‘Oh, 
William, I’m so happy—go right in and tell him to 
stay to dinner.’ Say, give me that pencil. I’ll sign 
up for three copies while I’m at it.” 

Looking through the window, the agent saw that 
the bulldog was listening, and he must in some way 
have understood, for he shook himself and walked 
mournfully back to the barn. 

If lifelong practice will bring perfection in the 
art of communicating with the deaf, my daughter 
ought to be an expert. Her experience shows some¬ 
thing of the magnitude of the job. This young 
woman and her mother attended a reception at the 
Old Ladies’ Home. There was to be a very fine 
musical program, and the elder lady, as one of the 
managers, appointed her daughter a scout to see that 
all the old ladies came in to hear the music. This 
energetic scout found one sweet-faced inmate wait- 


MIXING WORD MEANINGS 


159 


iiig patiently in her room, even after the entertain¬ 
ment had started. 

“Can you hear the music?’’ 

The young woman knows how to talk to the deaf, 
and she did her best. 

“What?” 

“Are you not coming to hear the music?” 

The words were carefully separated, and shouted 
close to the ear. 

“Hey, who’s sick? I’m sure I don’t know.” 

The old lady hear one sound clearly, and twisted 
it into the wrong word. 

“Of course, you went on and explained the thing 
carefully to her,” I suggested. 

“No, - 1 did not. I just changed the subject, and 
told her it was a fine day.” 

And that, I take it, is typical of much of the effort 
to interpret life to the deaf. We can always tell 
them that it is a fine day. The old lady sat con¬ 
tentedly in the silence, unaware of the fact that near 
at hand the orchestra was working gloriously 
through what the local paper called a “fine musical 
program.” The chances are that she was better off in 
the silence, Most of us hear too much, anyway. 


CHAPTER XI 


“The Whispering Wire” 

Telephone Difficulties—Seeing and Believing—Bell and the 
First Telephone—Choosing Intermediaries by Professions 
and Appearance—When the Bartender Beat the Preacher 
and the Farmer—The Prohibition Convention—The He¬ 
brew Drummer as a Satisfactory Proxy. 

Often I wonder if those who make such glib use 
of the telephone can possibly realize what it means 
to be unable to operate it at all. I see my wife 
with the instrument at her ear bowing and smiling 
to some invisible talker some miles away. Some¬ 
times I ask why she should smile, frown, or nod, to 
some one over in the next county, and though she 
has never given a satisfactory answer, I take it that 
the mere sound of the human voice is enough to 
excite most of the emotions. This commonplace 
affair, as a matter of course conveying audible sound 
over long distance, becomes to the deaf marvelous, a 
contrivance almost uncanny. 

The woman who brought me up was very deaf, 
and, like many of us who live in the silence, very nar¬ 
row and most inquisitive. On Winter evenings she 
would often read aloud to us chapters from Isaiah 
describing some of the wonders which that poet and 
visionary predicted for the future. Then she would 

x6o 


“the whispering wire” 161 

give her own version of the account, while her hus¬ 
band nodded in his chair and I was busied with my 
own dreams. I now wonder what would have hap¬ 
pened if I had told her that some day a man would 
stand in the city of Boston with a small instrument 
at his ear and would hear a person in San Francisco 
talking in an ordinary tone of voice. At that time 
there was not even a railroad across the continent. 
West of Omaha was a wild Indian country, filled 
with cactus and alkali water. The folly of talking 
about delivering coherent sound across that waste! 
I have heard of a missionary who went to the interior 
of Africa and lived there with a pagan tribe. He 
told them stories of life in the temperate zone, and 
while they could not understand, thev made no 
objection and politely listened. Finally he told them 
that at one season of the year the water froze— 
that it became so hard that people could walk on it. 
Here was something tangible; they understood 
water. The statement that people could walk on it 
was a lie, of course, and they threatened to kill the 
liar. Another man, a Vermonter, went to the Island 
of Java and married a native woman. He told her 
• about buckwheat cakes and maple syrup in the Green 
Mountain State, and she would not believe him. 
Finally she came to regard him as a deceiver. He 
wrote me for help, and I sent him a sack of buck¬ 
wheat flour and a can of syrup. They made a journey 
half around the world, but at last the Vermonter 



162 ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 

cooked a batch of pancakes which quite restored him 
to favor. The deaf and the deficient are likewise 
hard to convince unless the evidence is put before 
them in terms of their own understanding. If I had 
presented my humble amendment to the prophecies 
of Isaiah, I think it would have been decided that 
I possessed an evil spirit of the variety which may 
be exorcised by a hickory stick. 

Later, as a young man, I saw Alexander Graham 
Bell working with the first telephone—a short line 
between Osgood’s publishing house in Boston and 
the University Press in Cambridge. It seemed then 
more of a toy than a device of practical value, and 
as I remember him, Bell was a rather shabby inven¬ 
tor. His messages were mostly a loud shouting of: 
“Hello! Hello! Can you understand me?” 

Beginnings are rarely impressive or attractive, 
and the actual pioneer seldom recognizes himself as 
such. I saw one of the great men of Boston stand 
and laugh at Bell's clumsy machine and at his efforts 
to make it work. 

“Bell,” he said, “it isn’t even a good plaything. I'll 
agree to write a letter, walk to Cambridge with it, 
walk back with the answer and get here long before 
you can ever get a reply with that thing.” 

And Bell looked up from liis apparent failure with 
a smile of confidence. 

“I will make it work. The principle is right. We 
will find the way. The time will come when this 


“the whispering wire” 163 

boy here will be able to talk with anyone in any part 
of New England without raising bis voice above an 
ordinary tone.” 

And as a boy 1 thought that if I could ever face 
criticism and ridicule with such confidence, the 
world, or at least as much of it as is worth while, 
would be mine. 1 bad faith in what Bell told us, 
and looked forward to the day when bis words would 
come true. The prophecy has been more than ful¬ 
filled for others, but for us of the silence the tele¬ 
phone remains a mystery which others must inter¬ 
pret for us. Yet somehow I feel as confident as Bell 
that in some way out of our affliction will come a 
new means of communication between humans w r hich 
will make the silence an enviable abiding-place. 

My children have become greatly interested in 
radio communication. As I write this one of my 
boys is developing a crude outfit with which he 
actually takes sound waves from the air and trans¬ 
lates them into music or speech. People tell me of 
great concerts and speeches sent through the air for 
hundreds of miles. Tonight thousands of country 
people, seated in their own homes, are listening while 
this marvelous instrument reaches up into the air 
and brings down treasures of sound until it seems as 
though the speaker or singer were in the next room. 
We deaf can readily understand what all this will 
mean for the future; it will undoubtedly do more 
than the automobile toward bringing humanity 


164 ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 

together and grouping the peoples of the world in 
thought and pleasure. Yet how little it will mean 
to us! It may even be an added cross, for evidently 
both pleasure and the business of the future are to 
depend more and more upon the ability to hear well. 

I can remember as though it were yesterday the 
day that Lincoln was assassinated. I was a small 
youngster, but the event was printed into my brain. 
1 know that news of this world-shaking event passed 
but slowly out into the country. There were lonely 
farms out among the hills where farmers did not 
know of Lincoln’s death for days. There was no way 
of quick communication. I thought of that during 
the last deciding baseball game between the Giants 
and the Yankees. Seated in our farmhouse beside 
his little radio ’phone, my boy could even hear the 
crack of the bat against the ball. He could hear 
the roaring of the crowd and the growl of “Babe” 
Kuth when the umpire called him out on strikes. 
And all this marvellous change has come about dur¬ 
ing my life! You may perhaps imagine the feelings 
of the deaf when they realize that they are shut 
away from such wonderful things. 

But modern life is so efficiently strung upon wires 
that even the deaf must at times make use of the 
telephone. Some of our experiences in selecting 
proxies to represent us at the wire are worth record¬ 
ing. Every deaf man who takes even a small part 
in modern business must make some use of the ’phone 


“the whispering wire*’ 165 

or be helplessly outdistanced in the race. In the 
West they tell of a Mexican who wanted to get a 
message to his sweetheart. They offered him his 
choice between the telegraph and the telephone, and 
explained the difference. He chose the telephone 
without hesitation, for he “wanted no man in be¬ 
tween.” The deaf man must have some one “in 
between,” and usually it is a matter of nice judgment 
to choose the person to occupy that position. From 
choice the deaf will take the telegram; they can 
read it, and the fact that each word costs a certain 
sum of money means a brief message. If telephone 
messages were paid for in the same way, all the 
world would gain in brevity of expression, or else 
the income taxes of telephone companies would soon 
pay the national debt. 

It is remarkable how a deaf person with good eyes 
comes to be an expert at estimating character by 
appearance or actions. I find that we unconsciously 
analyze habits or manners, and group the possessors 
with some skill. Let a man come to me and write 
out his questions, and I am very sure that I can tell 
his business. A doctor accustomed to writing pre¬ 
scriptions frames his questions slowly and stops at 
the end of each sentence to make sure of the next 
one. A bookkeeper writes mechanically, and seldom 
prepares an original question. A grocer or a dry- 
goods clerk, accustomed to writing down orders, 
betrays his occupation by certain flourishes with the 


l66 ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 

pencil when he tries to write out a question, just as 
he is seized with a desire to rub his hands together 
during a sale. One would think that a lawyer would 
be very successful at this task. He usually fails. 
I have appeared as witness in several lawsuits, and 
able lawyers have completely lost their efficiency 
(and their patience) in trying to cross-examine me. 
Should any deaf person who reads this be called to 
the witness chair, my advice would be absolutely to 
refuse to answer any question that is not written 
out and first read by the judge. His examination 
will not become tedious. To the lawyer who desires 
a clear, straight story from a deaf person, I should 
say make the questions short and clear. Have most 
of them typewritten beforehand, and keep good- 
natured. A deaf man who knows the resources of 
his affliction can become expert at concealing evi¬ 
dence. 

Many men tell me that they finally estimate a 
man’s power and character by the quality and tone 
of his voice. The substitute knowledge or “instinct” 
which we gain through observation is nowhere more 
useful than in selecting telephone proxies from 
strangers. Take this man with the stiff neck and 
erect shoulders. Where shall we draw the line 
between stupid obstinacy and firm character? Here 
is this shambling and shuffling person. Does his 
manner denote a weak, nerveless will, and inability 
to concentrate his mind, or is it merely superficial, 


“the whispering wire” 167 

easy-going good nature, when at heart he is capable 
of flashing out in anger or taking a bold stand? 
The fellow who keeps his hands in his pocket and 
the other who constantly waves them about—a deaf 
man may well beware when either appoach him. 
And what of the man who seems to be continually 
looking for post, tree or wall against which he may 
lean? We come to know them all. 

Some years ago I chanced to be in a small Alabama 
town, among people I had never seen before. My 
mission was a delicate one, demanding keen judg¬ 
ment and careful diplomacy. It became absolutely 
necessary for me to communicate promptly and pri¬ 
vately w T ith my wife, who at the time was on a steam¬ 
ship somewhere off Cape Hatteras. I could not use 
a telephone, but I found a man whom I could trust. 
So I telegraphed to Charleston and instructed my 
wife to call a certain ’phone number in this Alabama 
town. The message was repeated by wireless, and 
far off on the wind-blown ocean it reached the ship 
and was delivered. W T hen the good lady reached 
Charleston she called up the number I had given, 
delivered her message to good ears, and it was turned 
over to me accurately in writing. One can readily 
see how tragic it would be if the interpreter for the 
deaf man chanced to be careless or criminal, for I 
should regard it as no less than a criminal act for 
one purposely to deceive a deaf person. I have 
employed strangers of all colors and conditions in 


1 68 ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 

this position of trust, and it is pleasant to think 
that most of them have been efficient and true in the 
emergencies. For it is an emergency when one is 
suddenly called upon to act as interpreter in the 
affairs of a stranger. This matter of using the tele¬ 
phone has become so simple to most people that it is 
hard to realize the dire complications it may involve 
for the deaf. 

Once I was delegated to meet my sister and daugh¬ 
ter at the old Long Island ferry in New York. They 
had spent the day on the island, and were to come 
back at night. Before the Pennsylvania Railroad 
dug its tunnels under the East River passengers 
came across from Long Island City at Thirty-fourth 
street. The landing and the transfer to street-cars 
was a jumble at best. It was about the easiest place 
in the world to miss your friends in daylight, while 
in the evening, under the dim lights, hunting for 
human express packages was much like going 
through a grab-bag. My passengers did not arrive. 
There was no sign of them anywhere among the 
masses of humans which boat after boat poured out, 
I began to be worried, for neither of them had been 
over the route before. I found that the train they 
had named had arrived on time. Either they had 
not come or the great city had swallowed them. It 
was plainly a case where the telephone became a 
necessity, but I could not go to the nearest ’phone 
and call up the friends with whom they had been 


“the whispering wire” 169 

staying. 1 liad to find some proxy who would deliver 
my message and give me an honest report. All this 
was serious business at a time when the papers were 
full of stories of abductions and insults to girls. 
Whom could I trust in such a situation? 

I looked about, and finally decided to appeal to a 
man who resembled a Methodist minister. At least, 
he wore a black coat, a white tie, and had adorned 
his face with a pair of “burnsides.” Also, I caught 
a gesture—a spreading out of the hands—which 
seemed to say: “Bless you, my children!” So, as an 
occasional occupant of the pews, I confidently 
approached the pulpit. 

“My friend, can I ask you to use the telephone 
for me?” 

I learned then how slight a contraction of the 
facial muscles may change a beneficent smile into a 
snarl. 

“Why don’t you do it yourself?” I could see the 
words and the unpleasant frown. “Are you too 
lazy ?” 

I tried to explain the situation and show him that 
I could not hear; but he took no trouble to grasp 
my predicament. Several women had stopped to 
listen, and were smiling. I have learned that no 
man who wears white vest and tie can feel that 
women are laughing at him and retain his dignity. 
So my clerical gentleman turned on his heel and 
walked away. 



I/O 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


“1 have do time to bother !” 

No doubt, he was right. He could preach the 
Christian religion, hut had no time to practice it. 
It has always been my blessed privilege to see the 
humor of a trying situation. That dignified exit 
made me think of the deaf woman who lived in our 
old town. One day a stranger called, said he was a 
retired minister, and asked her to board him a week 
free of charge, so that he might “meditate over the 
follies of human life.” She refused, and lie became 
quite insistent. He roared in her ear: 

“Be careful, now, lest ye entertain an angel 
unawares!” 

She was quick to reply: 

“I’m deaf, but I'm reasonably acquainted with 
the Lord, and I know He won’t send no angel to my 
house with a cud of tobacco in his mouth.” 

After failing with the ministry, I approached a 
man who looked like a substantial farmer—a man 
apparently with some sense of humor, though I 
judged him to be a bit stubborn. 

“Sir, I need your help. I must find someone to 
telephone for me. My sister and daughter are in the 
country, and—” 

That was as far as I could go with him. He put 
one hand on his pocket as if to make sure of his 
wallet, and waved the other at me. 

“No, you don’t! I'm no ‘come-on.’ None of your 


“the whispering wire” 171 

bunco games on me. That story is too old; I've 
heard it before. Get out or I’ll call the police!” 

I think the last sermon I ever heard was preached 
from the text, “And they all, with one accord, began 
to make excuses.” 

Unfortunately, the preacher had never been deaf, 
so he did not develop all the possibilities of that text. 
But these rebuffs did not discourage me; they are 
only part of the “social service” which the deaf must 
expect. These men merely lacked the imagination 
needed to show them the pleasure which would surely 
come from doing a kindly act. They had declined 
opportunity. 

Near the station was a saloon. It was a warm 
night, and the door was open. I had just been 
offered the nomination for Congress on the Prohi¬ 
bition ticket in my home district. Of course, a Pro¬ 
hibition statesman has no business inside a saloon; 
but I paused at the door and looked in. A pleasant¬ 
faced, red-haired Irishman stood behind the bar, 
serving a glass of beer to a customer. I have always 
believed in experimenting with extremes. By hit¬ 
ting both ends one generally find a soft spot at the 
middle. I was on a desperate quest, and, having 
been rejected by the pulpit and the plow, I was will¬ 
ing to approach the bar. So I entered the “unholy 
place.” The bartender ran an appraising eye over 
ine, and like a good salesman asked: 


172 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


“What’ll it be—a beer? Or you likely need some 
of the hard stuff to brace you up?” 

“No; I want to find an honest man who will tele¬ 
phone for me. I cannot hear well, and I must have 
help. Can you do it?” 

“Sure I can, me friend, sure! ’Tis me job to serve 
the people. I'm very sorry for ye, and ye can borry 
me ears and welcome. Here, Mike! You run the 
bar while I help this gentleman find his friends.” 

And he did the job well. I wrote out my message 
and he went into the booth with it. Through the 
glass I saw him nodding his head and waving his 
hands in explanation. He came out all smiles. 

“Sure, and it’s all right. They missed the train 
through stopping too long to eat. They’re on their 
way now safe and sound, and happy as larks—and 
due in half an hour. They’d have let ye know, but 
couldn’t tell where to reach ye!” 

And he would have nothing but the regular toll for 
the service. But he put his hand on my shoulder 
and said: 

“Happy to meet ye. It’s a pleasure to serve such 
as ye. Come, now, and have something on me!” 

And right there I came as near accepting a drink 
as I ever did in my life. But there is one thing I did 
do. I declined the honor of running for Congress 
on the Prohibition ticket after receiving that 
kindly Christian service from a saloonkeeper. 

I told this story to a missionary who had spent 


“the whispering wire” 173 

much of his life among rough-and-ready customers. 
His comment was: 

“Many a hog will put on a white necktie, and many 
a saint will wear a flannel shirt, and one not overly 
clean at that. The best judge of a necktie is the 
hangman, and the final judgment over the boiled 
shirt is made at the wash tub. He who sells beer 
brewed in charity is a better man than he who de¬ 
livers sermons stuffed with cant and selfishness.” 

I presume he is right, but how can a deaf man 
distinguish the virtures and vices of the dispenser of 
selfish sermons from those of the dispenser of charit¬ 
able beer—when he cannot hear the sermons and 
declines to taste the beer? However, since that night 
I have not been able to trust the combination of 
white vest and necktie and a taste for “burnsides.” 

My experience with this variety of costume had 
begun years before, when I happened to be a recep¬ 
tive candidate for Governor of New Jersey on this 
same Prohibition ticket. My boom never developed 
beyond that receptive stage, but I started for the 
convention feeling well disposed toward myself—as 
I presume all candidates do. At Trenton I had to 
hunt for the convention hall, and, as usual, tried to 
select the proper guide from his appearance. On 
a street corner stood a portly, well-filled gentleman, 
wearing a suit of solemn black, with a beard to 
match; also there was the white necktie and the 
voluminous white vest In truth, he was a prosper- 


174 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


ous grocer come to town to marry his third wife, but 
to me he looked like the chairman of the coming con¬ 
vention. 

“Can you tell me where the convention is to be 
held ?” 

“What convention ?” 

“Why, the State Prohibition convention. I 
thought you were a brother delegate.” 

“Brother nothing.” 

“But where is it to be held?” 

He muttered something that was lost in that black 
beard. I could not get it, and finally held out my 
note book and pencil. He stared at me for a moment, 
and then wrote—about as he would enter an order 
of salt fish for Mrs. Brown: 

“The Lord knows. I don’t.” 

It was a shock to my boom, the first of many it 
received that day. For a moment depression came 
over me. Then philosophy came to my aid and gave 
me the proper answer. 

“Well, if the Lord really knows, I guess it doesn’t 
make so much difference whether you do or not! 
It is better to trust in the Lord.” 

I left him staring after me. It is doubtful if he 
ever got the full sense of the incident, but I have 
always remembered it. 

It is one of my landmarks along the road to silence. 
For if the Lord designs that the deaf man shall reach 
the convention, all the powers of prejudice and sel 


“the whispering wire” 175 

fishness cannot keep him away. I finally found a 
bootblack who gave me the proper directions. 

One Winter’s night I found myself in the railroad 
station of a small New England town, waiting for 
a belated train. A blizzard was raging outside, with 
the mercury in the thermometer close to zero. My 
train was far up in Vermont, four hours behind time, 
feebly plowing through snowdrifts. In order to 
obtain a berth and comfortable passage for New 
York on that train it was necessary to ’phone Spring- 
field and have the agent there catch the train at some 
stopping place up country to make arrangements. 
Perhaps a prudent deaf man should have given up 
the effort and remained in that little town overnight. 
But I have found that the deaf, even more than oth¬ 
ers, need the constant stimulus of attempting the 
difficult or impossible. 

It was necessary to find some honest proxy at 
once. The ticket agent had closed his office and gone 
home. The array of available talent spread before 
me on the seats was not, at first sight, promising. 
A German Socialist had fallen asleep after a violent 
discussion about the war. There was an Irishman 
who gave full evidence to at least three senses that 
he did not favor prohibition enforcement. A fat, 
good-natured looking colored man with a stupid 
moon face and a receding chin sprawled over one 
of the wooden benches. An Italian woman, sur¬ 
rounded by several great packages, was holding a 


176 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


sleeping child. There were two ladies of uncertain 
age, who evidently belonged to that unmistakable 
class of society—the New England old maid. At one 
side, figuring out his day’s sales of cigars and no* 
tions, was a typical Hebrew drummer, a little rat¬ 
faced man with hooked nose, low, receding forehead, 
and bald head and beady eyes. 

Now, if you had been the deaf man, forced to 
depend on one of these agents to arrange for a sleep¬ 
ing place, which one would you have chosen? The 
negro was too stupid, the German too belligerent, 
the Irishman would have tried to bully Springfield, 
and who could think of asking the stern-faced ladies 
to discuss such a matter? I selected the drummer 
as the most promising material. 

“Sure, I get it,” he said, when I gave him a state¬ 
ment of what I wanted. He disappeared inside the 
telephone booth, where I soon saw him gesticulating 
and shrugging his shoulders as he talked rapidly. 
He looked around at me, and with my slight knowl¬ 
edge of lip-reading, I could make out: 

“This is a great man what asks this. You must 
help him out.” 

Soon he came rushing out holding up one finger. 

“It cost you one dollar!” 

I paid him and back he went to his conversation. 
Before long he emerged with a paper, on which he 
had written the name of the car, the number of my 
berth, the name of the conductor, and the time of 


“the whispering wire” 177 

the train’s arrival. It was all there. How he did 
it I have never been able to tell. It was a marvel of 
speedy, skilful work. 

I seldom find such an efficient proxy, but through 
long experience one becomes able to select some 
stranger with patience enough to attempt the job. 
One man who seemed fairly intelligent completely 
twisted my message, and put me to no end of trouble. 
Once a woman deliberately misrepresented me, but 
I was saved by a good Samaritan who stood by, 
heard part of the discussion, and set me right. 

Sometimes in public places the telephone operator 
will send the message and report the answer, but it 
seems unfair to ask such service. A very dignified 
gentleman once asked a stranger to telephone for 
him, and was answered thus: 

“Why not go and visit with the ‘hello girl’ over 
there ?” 

Being deaf, he lost one important syllable of the 
adjective, and something of his dignity in conse¬ 
quence. Never select a person without imagination 
as proxy for the deaf. In the city the colored por¬ 
ters who are found about public places are usually 
excellent telephone agents; colored waiters I have 
also found good. They are good-natured and imagi¬ 
native, usually intelligent, and always wonderfully 
faithful. 


CHAPTER XII 


“No Music in Himself” 

Music—Beethoven in the Silent World—And Milton—Our 
Emotional Desert—Dream Compensation—The “Sings” 
in the Old Farmhouse, and the “Rest” for the Weary— 
The Drunken Irish Singer in the Barber Shop. 

“The man that hath no music in himself, 

Nor is not moved by concord of sweet sounds 
Is fit for treasons, stratagems and spoils; 

The motions of his spirit are dull as night, 

And his affections dark as Erebus. 

Let no such man be trusted.” 

This passage always reminds me of the colored 
man who went to church to hear the new minister’s 
trial sermon. The preacher was fond of quotations, 
and among others he gave an old favorite in new 
guise: 

“He who steals my purse is po’ white trash!” . 
One of the elders of the church immedately jumped 
up and interrupted: 

“Say, brother, where you done git that idee at?” 
“Dat, sar, am one ob the immortal, thoughtful 
gems of William Shakespeare.” 

“Well, sar,” came in rich tones from the gentleman 
who had come to criticise the sermon, “my only 
remark am: Amen, Shakespeare!” 

178 


179 


“no music in himself” 

Shakespeare certainly did not have the citizens of 
the silent world in mind when he wrote that, but we 
deaf are often moved to say Amen. Stratagems are 
somewhat out of our line, since they require good 
ears to carry them through, but otherwise this is a 
perfect description of what the lack of music may 
mean to us. It is our greatest loss. We may rise 
in imagination above many deprivations, but we can 
never forget the sinister fate which keeps from our 
ears forever the beauty of the singing voice and the 
vibrating string. 

“Music hath charms to soothe the savage breast. 

To soften rocks or bend the knotted oak.” 

Probably Congreve was drawing on his imagina¬ 
tion entirely, especially as it is not likely that he 
ever encountered a genuine savage; but a deaf man 
with a natural love for music could have given him 
full understanding and appreciation of its mighty 
power. And, on the other hand, the silent life 
becomes drab and cold without the sweet tones of 
harmony. In this respect I think the man who was 
born deaf has less to regret than he who has known 
music only to lose it. 

One of the most wretchedly pathetic figures in 
human history was Beethoven when he became con¬ 
vinced that he was losing his hearing. He realized 
at last that the melodies which meant all of life to 
him were passing from him with ever-increasing 


I So ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 

rapidity. He must have watched them go as a con¬ 
demned man might see the sands dropping through 
the hourglass. For Beethoven was sadly deficient 
in the needed equipment of one who must enter the 
silent world. He had nothing but his music. There 
was no remaining solace. The deaf Beethoven does 
not present an heroic picture; he seems like a man 
cast upon a desert island without the instinct or the 
ability to search intelligently for food and water. 
There can be nothing more tragic than the fate of 
such a man thrown into alien conditions which 
demand skill and courage of a high order, who yet 
stands helpless through grief or terror. Compare 
Beethoven’s unmitigated despair with Milton’s’ he¬ 
roic serenity: 

‘‘Who best 

Bear his mild yoke, they serye him best; his state 
Is kingly; thousands at his bidding speed, 

And post o'er land and ocean without rest; 

They also serye who only stand and wait.” 

•j t . 

But here we also see something of the different 
effects upon character of the two afflictions. The 
blind are more cheerful than the deaf. Some of their 
cheerfulness comes through the ability to hear 
music; the courage comes through their inability to 
see the danger. 

When we deaf are adapting our lives to the inevit¬ 
able we are surprised to find the number of new 


“no music in himself” 181 

handles life really presents. We have been forced 
to look for them, and we can find new interests to 
give us a fresh hold upon life. Yet there is nothing 
we can do, there is no thought, philosophy or mental 
training that will ever be anything but a poor sub¬ 
stitute for music. 

Perhaps the most peculiar sensation in all our 
alfiiction comes when we sit in a room where skilled 
musicians are playing, and observe the effect of 
sound upon our companions. They are moved to 
laughter or tears. Their eyes brighten, their hands 
are clenched, or are beating time to the music; their 
faces flush as waves of emotion sweep over them. 
To us it seems most commonplace. We can merely 
see nimble fingers dancing over the piano keys or 
touching the strings of the violin. Perhaps we see 
the singer opening and shutting her mouth—much 
as she would eat her food—and this is all we know. 
The mechanical processes may even be grotesque. So 
far as any effect upon our emotions may be consid¬ 
ered, the flying fingers might as well be sewing or 
knitting, the mouth might be talking the ordinary 
platitudes of conversation. The thrill is not for us. 
Large audiences rise while “America” is being sung 
or played—men and women listen with bowed heads. 
I stand up with them, but I hear no sound. I feel 
a thrill—for it is my country, too; yet can I be 
blamed for feeling that life has denied me the power 
to be as deeply stirred with that great emotion, and 


182 ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 

has given me no substitute? The mighty charms 
which may “soften rocks or bend the knotted oak” 
are made powerless by the little bones which have 
grown together inside my ear, and they are the small¬ 
est bones in the body. 

I have talked with deaf persons about their con¬ 
ception of heaven. What will be the physical sensa¬ 
tion when what we call “life” is finally stolen away ? 
I have given much thought to that. Most deaf people 
tell me without hesitation that, according to their 
great hope and belief, some great burst of music will 
suddenly be borne in upon them when : 

“The casement slowly grows a glimmering square.” 

They can conceive of no greater joy or reward; no 
existence more sublime than that which is filled with 
the noblest music. 

Partial compensation for the longing and its 
denial comes with the music that we hear in dreams. 
The brain treasures up the desires of our waking 
hours, and attempts to satisfy them during sleep. 
I knew of a man who had lived a wild, sunny life in 
the open air. He was thrown into prison unjustly, 
and was held in a dark cell for weeks. He was able 
to endure this because, as he said, he had for years 
“soaked up all possible sunshine.” The sun’s energy 
had been “canned in his system,” and it carried him 
through his trouble. So may the deaf man be cheered 
after he enters the silent world if in his youth he 
was able to “soak up” his full share of music. It 


i8 3 


“no music in himself” 

was my privilege as a boy to serve as “supe” or 
stage-hand at a theater, where I heard most of the 
great operas. The memory of that music has 
remained with me all through these long years. 
Sometimes I am tempted to sing one of those won¬ 
derful songs to my children. I presume there are 
few objects more ridiculous to a musician than a 
deaf man trying to sing. My people may well smile 
at my painful efforts (though the children do not, 
until they become worldly-wise), but they will never 
understand unless they become exiled to the silent 
land what such remembered music really means. 
But I must wait for dreams, wherein all outside 
conventions and inhibitions are thrown off, to give 
me the perfect rendition of remembered melodies. 

There was an old farmer who used to scold his 
daughter because she would spend five dollars of her 
money for an occasional trip to the city, where she 
could hear famous singers. 

“Why,” said he, “what nonsense, what folly to 
spend five dollars for only two short hours of pleas¬ 
ure.” 

But he did not realize that the money was paying 
for a memory which would remain with the girl all 
her life. I would, if I could, have a child soak his 
soul full of the noblest music that human power 
can give him. 

In a fair analysis of the situation even the advan¬ 
tages of being deaf to music should be stated. I am 
not asked to listen while little Mary plays her piece 


184 ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 

on the piano. No one primes little Tommy to sing 
“Let me like a soldier fall” for my benefit. I am 
not required to render any opinion regarding the 
musical ability of those hopefuls. I am told that 
such musical criticism has developed some most 
remarkable liars, chiefly, I fancy, among the young 
men who are particularly interested in little Mary’s 
older sister. I am also informed that some of the 
singing to which you must listen is rather calculated 
to rouse the savage breast than to soothe it. Once 
1 spent the night at a country house where, long 
after honest people should have been abed, a com¬ 
pany of young men drove out from town to serenade 
the young lady daughter. I slept through it all, 
from “Stars of the Summer Night” to “Good Night, 
Ladies!” The father of the serenaded one was a 
very outspoken business man, whose word carried 
far, and he assured me that I was to be envied, for 
the “quartette of calves” kept him awake for hours. 
He wanted someone to give them more rope. “Why,” 
said this critical parent, “you should have heard 
these softheads sing ‘How Can I Bear to Leave 
Thee?’ I tried to make them understand that I 
could let them leave without turning a hair.” Hand 
organs beneath the window, German bands blowing 
wind, wandering minstrels of all kinds, may start 
waves of more or less harmonious sound afloat, so 
that my sensitive friends go about with fingers at 
their ears, while I have the pleasure of imagining 


i8S 


“no music in himself” 

that it is angel music. But at the end of all this 
satisfactory reasoning I shrug my shoulders and 
begin to figure what I would give if I could go back 
through the years to one of the old “sings” in my 
uncle's kitchen. How I should like to bring back 
the night when the stranger from Boston sang 
“Jesus, Lover of My Soul” to that beautiful air from 
“Norma.” 

However, if I could have my choice tonight of all 
the music I have ever heard, I should go back to that 
lonely farmhouse beside the marsh. The neighbors 
have come over the hill for a Sunday night “sing.” 
No lamps are needed, for there is a fine blaze in the 
fireplace. There is snow outside, and creepy, crack¬ 
ling sounds from the frost are in the timbers; the 
moonlight sparkles over all. One of the girls sits 
at the little melodeon. I’d give—well, what can a 
man give—to hear old Uncle Dwelly Baker sing 
“Rest for the Weary.” I can see him now sitting in 
the big rocking-chair by the window. How his bald 
head and his white whiskers shine in the moonlight! 
His eyes are shut, his spectacles have been pushed to 
the top of his head. He rocks and rocks, singing: 

“On the other side of Jordan, 

In the sweet fields of Eden, 

Where the tree of Life is blooming, 

There is rest for you.” 

And here we all come in on the chorus: 



ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


186 


“There is rest for the weary, 

There is rest for the weary, 

There is rest for the weary, 

There is rest for you!” 

My reason for choosing this above all other music 
is that these people in their dull, hard life were 
really weary, and they really found rest in this song. 

Some years ago I went for a shave into a barber 
shop of a New England city. I was to deliver an 
address, and somehow I have found nothing more 
soothing to the nerves than to sink down into a chair 
while the barber rubs in the lather aud then scrapes 
it off. All this, of course, is conditioned upon the 
sharpness of the razor and my inability to hear the 
barber’s questions. I have often wondered if imagi¬ 
native barbers ever feel a desire to seize the victim 
by the throat and use the razor like a carving-knife. 
Several of them have looked at me as though they 
would enjoy doing this, and the thought has actually 
driven me to a safety razor. But, at any rate, shortly 
before this speech was due I weut in for my shave. 
At that time I carried an electric instrument, a sort 
of personal telephone, which enabled me to hear at 
least part of conversations. It contained a small 
battery, a sound magnifier and an ear piece. I hung 
this on a nail, threw my overcoat and hat over it, 
and sat down for my shave when the boss barber 
motioned “next.” 

I think I must have drifted away in a half-dream 


i8- 


“no music in himself” 

while the barber went over one side of my face. He 
was just brushing in the hot lather on the other side 
when I suddenly became aware of a great commotion 
in the shop. I straightened up with one side of my 
face well lathered, to find a “spirit hunt” in progress. 
The barber stood with his brush in one hand and an 
open razor in the other. Several men had armed 
themselves with canes and umbrellas. A fierce-look- 
ing Irishman with a club was stealthily approaching 
mv overcoat as it hung on the nail. He raised his 
club to strike a heavy blow. I jumped out of that 
chair as I fancy a person would leave the electric 
chair if he were suddenly freed. I caught him by 
the arm. 

“What are you spoiling my overcoat for?” 

“It’s a spirit. The devil himself. Hear him holler 
in there! Hark at him! Do ve not hear thiin 
groans ?” 

Then it suddenly came to me what the “spirit” 
was. I had put my “acousticon” or electric hearing 
device into its case without shutting off the electric 
current. It was really a small telephone, and while 
the current is on, the sound magnifier gathers the 
sounds in a room and throws them out in a series of 
whistles, groanings and roarings. The Irishman and 
his friends had finally located the “spirit” emitting 
these noises under my coat, where it certainly was 
hiding. 

With the coating of lather still on my face, I took 


1 88 ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 

the coat down and explained the instrument. The 
men listened like children as I switched the current 
on and off, explained the dry cell battery, the ear 
piece and the receiver. I let them try it at the ear 
until they were satisfied—all but the Irishman. He 
looked at the machine for a moment and then glanced 
at me and raised his voice: 

“Ye poor thing; ye don’t hear nothin’, do ye?” 

“Not much. I have the advantage of you, for you 
must listen to everybody. I don’t have to. I am 
sure you have heard things today you were sorry to 
hear.” 

“Ain’t that right now? But don’t nobody ever 
come and bawl ye out?” 

“No; not even my wife, for, you see, her throat 
would give out before my ears would give in. Bawling 
out a deaf man is no joke for the bawler!” 

“Well, it’s good to be delivered from the women; 
they have tongues like a fish-hook, ’tis true. But 
don’t ye hear no good music ?” 

“No; I have not heard natural music for years; 

t. 7 

the little that comes to me seems to have some tin- 
pan drumming in it.” 

“But, say, mister, don’t ye hear no good music 
in your dreams? I ask ye that now—as man to man. 
Have ye no singing dreams?” 

“Yes, that is the strangest part of it. While T am 
asleep music often comes to me, such music as, I 


“no music in himself” 189 

am sure, mortal rarely hears. It seems to me like 
music far beyond this world.” 

“Ah, but don’t ye hate to wake up and leave that 
music behind ye? Don’t ye hate to come back to 
life, where ye hear no sound? Ain’t it terrible to 
think God has forsaken ye by shutting out music? 
Wouldn’t ye rather be dead when ye might sleep for¬ 
ever with music in your ears?” 

“No; for God has not forsaken me. I have mv 
work to do in the world, and I must do it. I will not 
run away from a thing like this. I will rise above it. 
You see, I have friends. You are interested, and I 
know you would help me if I needed help.” 

“Would I not, now? Just put that tail-piece to 
your ear.” 

I hesitated for a moment, but he repeated, sternly*. 

“Put that tail-piece to your ear and let on the 
juice again right away.” 

With the cold lather still on my face, I put up the 
ear piece and turned on the current. Then a beau¬ 
tiful thing happened. My Irish friend took off his 
bat, put his mouth close to my receiver, and began 
to sing. He had a beautiful tenor voice, and it came 
to me sweet and clear, while the barber and the 
others gathered to listen. 

“Kathleen mavourneen, the gray dawn is breaking, 
The horn of the hunter is heard on the hill. 

The lark from her gray wing the bright dew is 
shaking—• 


190 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


Oh, Kathleen mavourneen,—what? lingering still? 

Oh, hast thou forgotten, this day we must sever, 
Oh, hast thou forgotten, this day we must part?” 

He sang it through—the sad, hopeless longing of a 
weary heart. “It may be for years , and it may be 
forever ” I glanced at the barber, and saw him still 
with the open razor and the brush in his hands, while 
the others stood about with heads bowed as they 
listened. And at the end of the song my friend 
started another: 

“Come back to Erin, mavourneen, mavourneen, 

Come back, aroon, to the land of thy birth. 

Come with the shamrocks of springtime, mavour¬ 
neen, 

And its Killarney shall ring with thy mirth!” 

I have often thought that to another deaf man 
we would have presented a most ridiculous spectacle. 
By this time I had discovered that my musical friend 
was by no means a prohibitionist; the breath which 
carried the sweet sound had a flavor all its own. He 
had been tarrying with other spirits besides the col¬ 
lection under my overcoat. I, still with the thick 
smear of lather, diligently held the “tail-piece” to my 
ear; the barber was scowling to hide his emotion, 
and with the open razor he looked like a pirate. Yet 
1 think there has never been such music since the 
glorious night long ago when the angels’ song was 
heard by men. \ou will smile at the extravagant 


193 


“no music in himself’’ 

speaker who was to hold the stage until I came had 
already repeated part of his speech three times. The 
barber finished shaving me, and I went my way; 
but 1 shall always remember my Irish singer and 
his philosophy. 

“A man in trouble must either laugh or die ” 


CHAPTER XIII 


Silence Not Always Golden 

Looking Wise and Saying Nothing—Passing Encouragement 
Around—The Critic and the Short Skirts—The “Lion” 
and the Honest Deaf Man—How Reputation and the Deaf 
Man Overtook the Hon. Robt. Grey—The Simultaneous 
Blessings at the Dinner-table—Jealousy and Mrs. Brew¬ 
ster. 

It lias been said of a Cape Cod man that if he 
will tell where he comes from, look wise and say 
nothing, he will pass as a person of fine intellect. 
Much the same is true of the deaf man. He is too 
apt to talk all the time, or else to say nothing—and 
sometimes he does both at once. Many of us betray 
the shoals of our mind and our shallow waters of 
thought by talking too much. The Yankee is nat¬ 
urally inquisitive. He has injured his position in 
history by asking too many useless questions. Un¬ 
fortunately, this is also the failing of too many of 
the deaf. Instead of realizing that the choicest bits 
of conversation are reserved for them, they persist 
in trying to borrow the dross. Cardinal Wolsey’s 
outburst of bitter self-reproach would be a valuable 
memory gem for us: 

“I charge thee, fling away ambition. 

By that crime fell the angels.” 

194 


SILENCE NOT ALWAYS GOLDEN 


195 


Here we must part with the foolish ambition to 
deal in small talk. The surest way for us to become 
social nuisances is constantly to demand the details 
of current conversation, and some of our worst 
embarrassments come when some well-meaning, loud- 
voiced person diligently relays to us the trivial 
remarks. For be it known that the bubbles of words 
which work up from the feeble fermenting of shallow 
thoughts are usually stale aud unprofitable. And 
many a deaf person has passed an hour of agony 
in company smiling and pretending to enjoy conver¬ 
sation which might as well be carried on in Europe, 
as far as his understanding goes. A student of lip- 
reading can find much amusing practice in such situ¬ 
ations, but it is far better for the rest of us to say 
frankly that we cannot hear the talk, and then retire 
from the field with a book. 

Every deaf person who possesses even a trace of 
humor can tell how he or she has passed as an im¬ 
portant personage by looking wise and saying noth¬ 
ing. On several occasions 1 have played the part of 
intelligent critic with some success. I can sit 011 
the front seat at a lecture or a concert, look intently 
at the speaker or singer, smile and frown at the right 
places in the program, and make an effort to look 
wise. The performer soon comes to think that he 
has at least one very keen and appreciative listener, 
and soon he aims the best points at me. Of course, 
we all know how the heart and spirit glow in the face 


196 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


oi evident appreciation. I do not hear a sound, but 
I present the appearance of the mighty rock in the 
weary land of inattentive listeners. I have even had 
the susceptible artist hunt me out afterwards, evi¬ 
dently seeking some delicate compliment—for who 
is proof against such desires? However, I keep out 
of the way, for it would never do for him to find that 
the appreciative hearer is a deaf man. A friend of 
mine, working on the same principle of passing 
encouragement around, keeps an eye open for deaf 
men or those who seem discouraged, and when he 
meets some one who seems to be losing his grip, he 
gives a military salute. When his children criticise 
such a performance, he says: 

“Why not? It makes him feel good. It inoculates 
his pride. He goes on his way thinking that perhaps 
after all he may be somebody, since that ‘distin¬ 
guished-looking man’ recognized him!” 

There is a sorry old joke that I have played 
repeatedly on vain or inquisitive people. I worked 
it off on my friend, Brown, three times running 
Brown is the type of fellow who is much in love with 
his own voice. They tell me that he can deliver a 
fair speech, but that he spoils the effect by making 
it quite evident that he is casting pearls, and that 
lack of proper appreciation classes the audience 
with a well-known suggestion of the New Testament. 
I have never heard Brown’s words, but his actions 
speak loudly to a deaf man. So I wait until he 


SILENCE NOT ALWAYS GOLDEN 


197 


begins to describe some oratorical triumph and then 
start on him. 

“Great! I know a man down town who would 
gladly pay five hundred dollars to hear you speak. 
Thus far he has not been able to hear you.” 

Brown absorbs the compliment with the air of a 
man well accustomed to such little tributes. But 1 
know how his mind is working, and, sure enough, 
soon he rises to the bait. 

“By the way, what did you say about that man 
who is anxious to hear me speak?” 

“I said that there is a very intelligent man down 
town who says he would give five hundred dollars 
to hear you speak. Thus far he has been denied that 
privilege, but I think he means what he says.” 

“That’s good! No doubt some one who has heard 
me has told him about it. I expect to speak at a 
banquet next week. Perhaps we could have this 
man invited. I should be glad to give him pleasure.” 

“It certainly would give him great pleasure. I 
am sure he would travel far to get within sound of 
your voice.” 

“By the way, I do not recall that you mentioned 
the name of this gentleman.” 

“He is a deaf man. He has not heard a sound for 
years! I know he would give five hundred dollars to 
he able to hear you. ,y 

And then Brown refuses to speak to me for a 
month. He has no use for these “funny men.” His 


198 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


vanity tinally gets the best of him, however, and a 
little later he “falls” for the same story with varia¬ 
tions. You can tell him of the man who would will¬ 
ingly give a thousand dollars to see the great orator. 
Of course, he is blind. Then there is the enthusiastic 
citizen who would gladly run a mile in order to join 
the audience. He is a cripple with only one leg. 
Of course, these are worn, old jokes, but the deaf man 
may be pardoned for indulging in the old-timers if 
they help to offset some of his own blunders and 
mishaps. 

Let it be known, however, that we deaf never shine 
as critics where our opinions will have weight. Some 
men, naturally strong and dominant, reach high 
positions, where they have power over others, and 
they become hard taskmasters because through their 
inability to hear they make too many snap judgments 
and become too critical. They may be efficient, but 
frequently it is a raw and brutal efficiency which 
accomplishes little good. One very deaf man was 
invited to a meeting of a literary society in a 
W estern town. It seemed to be the only entertain¬ 
ment in town that night, and though it was obviously 
no place for a deaf man, he went along with his 
fiiends. We know how to amuse ourselves at such 
places. We may not hear a word, but the mind can 
be kept active with some detail of business, or a 
review or something we have read. This man 
applauded and smiled with the rest. It is often a 


SILENCE NOT ALWAYS GOLDEN 


199 


foolish performance, but we invariably fall into it. 
By assuming a serious expression of countenance 
whenever it was apparent that the program called 
for thought, this man found himself being accepted 
as a wise critic. One young woman was determined 
to attract the attention of the distinguished-looking 
stranger. She read her essay with one eye on him, 
and he did his best to look appreciative. When the 
literary exercises were over the chairman called 
various leading citizens to discuss the meeting and 
criticise the various performances. The young woman 
was anxious to hear a word of praise from the 
visitor. So, at her suggestion, the president wrote a 
note and passed it to the deaf man—a note suggest¬ 
ing that he give a truthful criticism of at least one 
number. This fishing for compliments is like other 
forms of angling; you never know what you are 
going to catch. My friend protested and tried to 
explain, but there was no escape. Being a man of 
some determination, and, moreover, with severe old- 
fashioned ideas, he stood up and delivered his criti¬ 
cism : 

“My friends, I am no critic. Nature has made it 
necessary for me to hear with my eyes, and I can 
offer but one suggestion. I may be wrong. Perhaps 
1 am old-fashioned, but it seems to me that if I had 
to walk through life on such a pair of pipestems as 
I have seen tonight, they would be the last thing in 


200 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


the world that; I would take pride in exhibiting. 
I'd wear a dress that would sweep the floor.” 

The company reserved their laughter until they 
were safe at home, but with one accord everyone 
glanced at the short skirt of the literary young 
woman. It is safe to say that she never again sug¬ 
gested an unknown deaf man as critic of her literary 
efforts. 

Sometimes the deaf go fishing for compliments 
themselves, with very disastrous results. We may 
wisely conclude that few- bouquets will be thrown in 
our direction. Even those which reach us may con¬ 
tain some kind of hook concealed amid the flow r ers. 
Yet there was Henry Bascom, very deaf, very vain, 
and filled with the almost criminal idea that he could 
write poetry. He refused to w r ork at his trade, for 
he felt that his muse did not care to brush her skirts 
against overalls or working clothes. His brother- 
in-law, a blunt, outspoken man, w T as growing weary 
of “feeding lazy poets.” Once he roared out a pro¬ 
test, but Henry did not get it straight, and hoped it 
w r as some sort of compliment. So he insisted that 
his sister repeat it. But she hesitated. Finally she 
temporized: 

“George merely said something about the great 
need of energy in the world.” 

Of course, Henry should have known that there 
was explosive material hidden in all this, but he only 
decided that something fine was being kept away 


SILENCE NOT ALWAYS GOLDEN 


201 


from him. So when George came home lie began 
again: 

“George, I was much interested in what you said 
this morning. Won’t you repeat it so that I can 
have it exact?” 

And George very willingly compiled. He wrote 
the message carefully in ink: 

“I told Mary that if you belonged to me I would 
make you work even if you bust a gut!” 

Investigation will destroy illusion nine times out 
of ten. If you think your friends are saying nice 
things about you, let it go at that. Take my advice 
and let analysis of such doubtful remarks alone. 
Eight times out of ten, for the deaf, it will lead to 
an explosion. 

And there was the deaf man who went to the 
reception with his wife and daughter. Some remark¬ 
able literary lion had come to town, and the elite 
had turned out to see him feed and hear him roar, 
if he could be induced to perform. The deaf man, at 
his distance, watched the lion carefully and felt that 
here w T as a kindred spirit. For back of the stereo¬ 
typed smile and the smug mask of conventionality 
there was another person, a real human being, who 
had grown weary of the foolishness, and was eager 
to get back into the wilderness, where outsiders, like 
the deaf and the uncelebrated, may have their fling. 

But the women continued to parade themselves 
and their ideas before the celebrity with an osten- 


202 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


tation that was quite enough to rouse the ire of a 
sensible dweller in the silence. This man held in 
as long as he could, and then remarked to his wife 
in what he thought was a whisper: 

“Those silly girls make me very tired.” 

The entire company heard him, and the wife and 
daughter were deeply mortified. They did manage 
to cut off the rest of his remarks, and finally, exceed¬ 
ingly conscious that he had made a bad blunder, the 
deaf man retreated to the porch to look at the stars. 
They are old friends who never find fault when one 
stumbles over some woman-made rule of society. 
And there came the lion, broken away temporarily 
from his keepers, fumigating with a cigar some of 
the thoughts which his admirers had aroused. He 
went straight to the deaf man and held out his hand. 

“My friend, you are the only honest man in this 
house. The rest of us are tired, but we lack the 
courage to admit it in public. How do you come to 
be so brave?” 

Another deaf man went back to his old town after 
fifteen years’ absence. They were about to hold a 
political convention to nominate a candidate for 
Congress. The Hon. Robert Grey controlled most of 
the delegates. No one in particular was enthusiastic 
about the Hon. Robert excepting himself and his 
close friends, yet no one could quite summon the 
courage to tell the truth about him. The deaf man 


SILENCE NOT ALWAYS GOLDEN 


203 


arrived, and saw a large, black-haired man dominat¬ 
ing the stage. 

“Why,” he said, in what he intended to be a sub¬ 
dued tone, “there is Bob Gray. He’s the man who 
stole the town funds while he was treasurer. What’s 
he doing here? He should be in jail!” 

He had not gauged his voice correctly, and half 
the people in the hall heard him. It was just what 
the rest had lacked the courage to say. The deaf 
man, with his simplicity and directness, had pene¬ 
trated into the hiding place of the big issue of the 
campaign. His remark changed the entire spirit of 
the convention, and the Hon. Robert Grey was left 
at home. 

The deaf man is often laughed at for his blunders, 
but, unwittingly, he has pricked many a bubble and 
exposed many a fraud through his blunderings. 
Take the case of the young man who fancied the 
minister’s daughter and went to church with her. 
The congregation was small, and the collections 
were generally in line with the congregation. The 
collector was a deaf man, a faithful attendant, who, 
as he said, could not even hear the money drop into 
the box. Our young man took a five-dollar gold 
piece out of his pocket and held it up so that the 
minister’s daughter could see it and observe his 
great liberality. She protested in a whisper: 

“Oh, that’s too much! I wouldn’t give that 
amount.” 


204 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


“Oh, that’s nothing. My usual habit is to give ten 
dollars, but I don’t happen to have such a coin with 
me today.” 

So the bluffer waved her away, and really would 
have been able to “get away with it” had it not been 
for the deaf man. When the box was presented the 
young man deftly palmed his gold piece and dropped 
a penny into the box. The organist played on 
through the offertory, and the deaf man marched 
up the aisle with his contributions. The minister 
had tried to tell him several times that it was not in 
good taste to report the size of the contributions 
publicly, but the deaf man was a zealous soul, and 
did not quite understand, so he carefully counted 
the amount found in the box, and, just before the 
last hymn, he stood up in front of the pulpit. 

“My friends, I want to announce that the contri¬ 
butions for the day amount to $3.27. ‘The Lord 
loveth a cheerful giver.’ ” 

And the minister’s daughter, being rather good 
at mental arithmetic, glanced at the young man, and 
fully understood. 

Dr. A. W. Jackson tells a story which all deaf 
men will appreciate. He was invited to preach the 
sermon in a country church, and after the service 
he was taken for dinner to Deacon Bentley’s house. 
There was a great family gathering, and the long 
table was spread in the kitchen. The deacon sat at 
one end, the minister at the other. Naturally, the 


jILENCE not always golden 


205 


minister expected to be asked to say the “grace,” so 
he prepared his mind for it. We deaf demand a 
“sign” for such invitations, and Dr. Jackson thought 
he had one when the deacon, far down the room, 
seemed to nod his head as at a suggestion. So the 
preacher shut his eyes, bent down his head and 
blessed the food with a long and fervent prayer. 
He knew something was wrong, for he felt the table 
shaking, but he went serenely on until he finished 
with a devout “amen.” How are we to know what 
really happens at such times until we get home, 
where our faithful reporter can tell us about it? 
Dr. Jackson did not in the least understand until 
his wife explained that Deacon Bentley had not 
given the expected sign, and, being deaf himself, he 
had bowed his own head and said a rival blessing. 
Probably the spectacle of the two deaf men offering 
simultaneous petitions blessed all who were present 
with abundant appetite. 

This was indeed ridiculous, but, no doubt, you 
have seen normal men acting in much the same way, 
foolishly interfering with the jobs or prerogatives 
of others when they know full well they have no 
business out of their own corners. It is like the 
group of men I saw at a country railway station 
trying to turn a locomotive on an old-fashioned turn¬ 
table. The engineer had run his machine on to the 
table, and though the men were pushing on the lever 
with all their might, they could not move the engine. 


206 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


Finally the engineer backed her about two feet. The 
weight was then so nicely adjusted that a single man 
turned the table with ease. At first there had been 
a poor adjustment. The men were trying to lift the 
entire weight; when it became nicely balanced the 
engine nearly turned itself. I think most men at 
some period of their lives get out of their own cor¬ 
ners to show others how the job of life should be 
worked out. They throw the machinery out of bal¬ 
ance and double the world’s work. 

Years ago, when I worked as a hired man in a 
back-country neighborhood, I belonged to a debating 
society. I was on the program committee, and 
we found something of a task in selecting subjects 
for debate which were within the life and thought 
of our audience. “Resolved, that the mop is a more 
useful element in civilization than the dishcloth” 
was a prime favorite with the women. “Resolved, 
that for a man starting on a farm a cow is more use¬ 
ful than a woman” brought out great argumentative 
effort from the men, and as I recall it, the cow won 
on the statement that if crops failed and you could 
hot pay the mortgage, you could sell the cow. If 
I were back there now, knowing what I do of life, 
I should suggest a new topic: “Resolved, that deaf¬ 
ness is a greater affliction to a woman than to a 
man.” Here is fine opportunity for argument. The 
man is shut out of many lines of bread-winning, 


SILENCE NOT ALWAYS GOLDEN 


207 


while the woman is denied the right to indulge 
largely in small talk and gossip. 

I think deaf women are more likely than men to 
be exceedingly jealous. Mrs. Helen Brewster was 
deaf, and she made life a burden to her husband, 
Frank. He was really one of the most circumspect 
of men, but if he stopped for a moment to talk with 
Miss Kempton, the sixty-year-old dressmaker, poor 
Helen was quick to imagine him taking advantage 
of her affliction to exchange nonsense with the other 
ladies. And right here let me say to the deaf and 
the near-deaf: force yourselves to believe that your 
friends, and particularly the members of your family, 
are absolutely true; do not ever permit your mind to 
suggest that those upon whom you must rely for 
help or interpretation are unfaithful. Never admit 
this until you cannot escape the conviction. Remem¬ 
ber that most persons we meet are kindly and well 
disposed, if selfish and thoughtless. They are not 
plotting our destruction or even our unhappiness. 
It is too easy for the deaf to turn life into a veritable 
hell by permitting the hideous devils of depression 
to master the brain. 

Now, Helen Brewster was jealous without reason, 
and perhaps the unreasonable phase of that disease 
runs its most violent course. The Brewsters lived 
on the ground floor of an old-fashioned town house. 
In the family living on the upper floor was a daugh¬ 
ter, Mary Crimmins, who caused Helen’s worst par- 


208 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


oxysms. In Winter, after an unusually hard storm, 
the old roof was endangered by its load of snow. 
Mary Orimmins called from her window to Frank as 
the only man then in the house to mount the roof 
and shovel away the snow. And Helen, washing 
dinner dishes at the sink, saw the two talking, Frank 
looking up and smiling, and immediately concluded 
that the topic was much warmer than snow. Frank 
got a ladder and a shovel, and mounted to the roof, 
while poor Helen sat in the sitting-room bathing her 
soul in misery, for while men do not usually present 
a ladder when planning an elopement in broad day¬ 
light, all things were possible to her distorted mind. 
Soon there came a small avalanche of snow from 
the roof, but the distracted deaf woman did not hear 
it. Then her son came rushing into the room, 
screaming with such breath as was left in him: 

“Oh, ma! It’s terrible!” 

“What’s the matter?” 

“The snow all slipped and knocked the ladder 
down, and pa—” 

“What about pa?” 

“He’s up there hugging—” 

Johnnie really finished his sentence, but the words 
“pa” and “hugging” were enough for Helen. 

“He is, is he? I’ll attend to him!” And she 
rushed upstairs and knocked loudly at the door; 
then, without waiting for any invitation, she strode 
in. Old Mrs. Crimmins sat knitting by the window, 


SILENCE NOT ALWAYS GOLDEN 


209 


while in a corner behind her sat Mary with a 
stranger, a fine-looking young man. Before the irate 
deaf woman could properly unload her mind, Mary 
blushing red, came and screamed in her neighbor’s 
ear: 

“This is my fiance, Henry Jordon. We meant to 
keep it secret, and you are the first one I’ve told. 
I know you won’t repeat it.” 

“But where’s Frank?” the astonished Helen at 
last managed to say. Johnnie had followed her 
upstairs, and he was well drilled in handling the 
deaf. So he caught hold of his mother’s dress and 
pulled her to the door. 

“Come and see, 111 a,” he cried. 

He led her downstairs, out into the snow and 
pointed. And there was pa. The snow had slipped 
beneath his feet, and carried him to the very edge 
of the roof. He had saved himself only by catching 
at the chimney. There he stood, with both hands 
clasped about it, “hugging” literally for dear life. 

It was a very silent and thoughtful deaf woman 
who raised the ladder and gave her husband a chance 
to discontinue his attention to the chimney. And 
that is about the way nine-tenths of our imaginary 
troubles terminate. It never did pay to hug a rumor 
or a delusion too strenuously. Better conserve your 
strength for something more substantial. 


CHAPTER XIV 


Cases of Mistaken Identity 

Traveling for the Deaf—When the Deaf Man Saved a Leg 
for Someone Else—The Cornetist Who Couldn’t Play a 
Note—When the Deaf Meet the Drunk. 

Some deaf persons make the mistake of concluding 
that the affliction chains them at home and that they 
should not attempt to travel. This is wrong, for 
they thus lose many extraordinary adventures. It 
is better for us to get about if possible, and to take 
our chances with the world. I travel about as freely 
as any man with perfect ears might do, and thus see 
much of human nature which would otherwise be 
lost to me. Xo adventures are more amusing or 
exciting than those which start with mistaken iden¬ 
tity. I have come to think that in the molding or 
shaping of humanity comparatively few patterns are 
really used, judging from the number of times that 
I and other deaf men have been mistaken for strange 
persons in the mental shuffle of ordinary minds. The 
man with good ears can usually explain at once, 
but we do not always understand, and we are led 
into embarrassing situations. 

Once years ago I went to the country to spend the 
night with an old friend. It was dark when we 


210 


CASES OF MISTAKEN IDENTITY 


211 


reached the little town where I was to meet “an 
elderly man with a gray beard/’ who would drive 
me to the farm. We deaf are careful to have all such 
arrangements understood beforehand. It was a 
black, gloomy night, and there were no lights at the 
little station except the lanterns carried by the agent 
and a few farmers. The deaf man is at his worst 
in darkness. It holds unimaginable terrors for him. 
Perhaps 1 should say perplexities, for the deaf are 
rarely afraid. 

Most of us do more or less lip-reading, whether 
we make a study of the science or not, and through 
long habit we come to make use of the eyes without 
realizing how largely our lives must depend upon 
light. Thus, when suddenly plunged into darkness, 
we are lost. I carried in my hand a small black 
case containing the electric instrument which I used 
as an aid to hearing, and this proved my undoing. 
Such a case may be accepted as professional evi¬ 
dence ; it may contain only a lunch or your laundry, 
but lawyers and physicians also carry similar ones. 
As I stood looking about in the dim light an elderly 
man with a short beard stepped up and held his 
lantern so as to view my face. I saw his lips frame 
the words: 

“Come on; hurry! We are all waiting.” 

I supposed he referred to supper, for I knew my 
friend had a very orderly and precise wife, who is 
a little deaf. One must be promptly on time in keep- 


212 ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 

iug appointments with such a character. The old 
man caught me by the arm, hurried me to a carriage, 
and fairly bundled me into it. He paid no attention 
to my questions, but jumped into the front seat and 
urged on the horse to full speed. The lantern swing¬ 
ing from the front axle went out as we bumped off 
into the darkness over mud holes and ruts "without 
number. I tried to get my electric device into opera¬ 
tion, but the plug had dropped out of place and I 
could not make connections. So on we plunged. 
Soon I found that the old man in front was nearly 
as deaf as I. The combination of two deaf men in 
the darkness rushing through what was to one of 
them an absolutely unknown country should have 
been thrilling, but the deaf man rarely experiences 
a thrill; he must wait for some one to tell him what 
it is all about. As usual, my mind worked back for 
some comparative incident. 

I remembered two. The year before I had gone 
to Canada during the Winter. A farmer met me at 
the station after dark. It was very cold, and the 
body of a closed carriage which had been put on 
runners was filled with straw. This made a warm, 
comfortable nest, and the farmer got in with me, 
while bis son sat up in front to drive. The same 
plug to my hearing device had dropped out, and in 
order to give me a light for finding it, my host struck 
a match. He held it too long and it burned his 
fingers. Then it fell into the straw and started a 


CASES OF MISTAKEN IDENTITY 


213 


great blaze. No two men ever showed greater activ¬ 
ity than we did as we plunged out of that carriage 
and threw in snow until the fire was extinguished. 
That scene came to my mind, and then followed the 
story oy Ian Maclaren of the great surgeon who 
came up from London to perform an operation, and 
was carried off into the wilderness against his will 
by the local doctor. 

We drove several miles, it seemed to me, and then 
suddenly turned into the yard of a farmhouse. 1 
felt the carriage shudder as the wheel grazed the 
stone gatepost. The door opened and a long splinter 
of light darted out upon us. Two women hurried 
down the walk and helped me out of the carriage. 
They were strangers to me, and now I was sure that 
] was in the midst of an exciting adventure, not at 
the home of my friend. The women escorted me to 
the house, where I found two solemn-faced gentle¬ 
men evidently waiting for me. One of them held up 
a finger and beckoned me into an adjoining room, 
where upon a bed lay a man who glared at me with 
no agreeable face. By this time I had my “acousti- 
con” in working order, and as this man evidently had 
something to say, I held the mouthpiece down to 
him and heard him shout: 

“I tell you I won’t have it cut off!” 

The two men who had brought me in were very 
much startled when the exact contents of my black 
case was revealed. They glanced at each other and 


214 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


then promptly escorted me out of the room. We 
went into the kitchen, and there, beside the stove, the 
mystery was explained. One of the men looked curi¬ 
ously at me and then asked: 

“Are you not Dr. Newton of New York?” 

I hastened to explain that I had never before heard 
of Dr. Newton. Then it was revealed to me that 
these men were country doctors, waiting to hold a 
consultation with the great surgeon, who had been 
expected to arrive on my train. The man on the bed 
had had serious trouble with his knee. These phy¬ 
sicians had agreed that the limb must be removed, 
yet both hesitated to perform a complicated opera¬ 
tion. Hence, the surgeon was coming to do it. The 
sick man’s father-in-law had gone to the station; he 
had been instructed to bring back a man of medium 
size, who said little and carried a black case of 
surgical instruments. I was to look for an elderly 
man with a gray beard. Father-in-law and I had 
mixed our signals. 

It took me but a short time to convince these 
physicians that I could not fill the bill or saw off 
the leg. At last it developed that the actual surgeon 
was detained and could not come until the following 
day. 

The man on the bed forgot his terror and laughed 
when I told him my story, and it gave him the fight¬ 
ing courage to compel his wife to telegraph the 
surgeon not to come at all. But those doctors acted 


CASES OF MISTAKEN IDENTITY 


215 


as though I had deprived them of their prey. In my 
capacity as substitute surgeou I gave the patient 
the best advice I knew of: 

“As one afflicted man to another, I advise you to 
hang right on to your leg. Try the faith cure and 
make yourself believe it can be saved.” 

“You bet I will. They'll have to cut my throat 
before they cut this leg off!” 

I saw him some years later. He carried a cane 
and limped, but he still had two legs. 

“They never cut it off,” he reported. “They put a 
silver cord in the joint, and it has held ever since. 
It’s a little stiff—but it’s a leg. I guess if Pa Morton 
and you hadn’t been deaf that night they would have 
finished the job.” 

I have heard of a deaf man who had an experience 
somewhat similar to this. He also left the train one 
dark, stormy night in a good-sized city. He was a 
stranger, so he was quite unfamiliar with the place. 
He carried a small black case containing his hearing 
device and a few toilet articles. As he stood in the 
dim light looking about for his friends, two men 
rushed up to him, talking quite excitedly; they 
grasped him by the arms and hurried him outside 
the station. Unable to understand the performance, 
the deaf man followed, trying to explain that he was 
wating for his friends. Almost before he knew it 
he found himself inside a car with these excitable 
gentlemen, driving rapidly through the streets. Of 


2l6 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


course, you wonder why deaf men under such con¬ 
ditions do not explain and break away. 

‘‘You wouldn’t catch me in any such situation,” 
says my friend Jones. “I’d soon make ’em under¬ 
stand.” 

There is only one thing the matter with Jones’ 
point of view—he has never lived in the silence. 
Let him try that and he will understand that philos¬ 
ophy assumes a form of patience in such situations. 
We are usually quite helpless in the darkness, and 
when we go among strangers we must either suspect 
everyone who approaches us or consider him a friend. 
Most of us conclude from experience that it is wiser 
to drop suspicion and assume that the majority of 
human beings are honest. And as the great emotion 
of fear apparently enters the brain through the ear, 
we are apt to be calm under most extraordinary 
conditions. 

We left our puzzled deaf man rushing in a car 
through the streets of an unknown city. The auto 
finally entered a narrow, dark alley and stopped be¬ 
fore what appeared to be the back door of a large 
building. The deaf man was urged out of the car 
by his nervous companions and was hurried up a 
steep stairway. They blundered through several 
dark passages and finally came out on the stage of 
a theater, where they stood in the wings and watched 
a long-haired pianist in the center of the stage labor¬ 
ing to unlock the keys of a piano in a way calculated 


CASES OF MISTAKEN IDENTITY 


217 


to let loose a horde of imprisoned melodies. A vast 
audience filled the house. 

A man who appeared to be master of ceremonies 
rushed up to the deaf man and wrote on his note¬ 
book : 

“Delighted to see you! We feared you were not 
coming. Your first number is next on the program. 
We will give the professor an encore while you are 
preparing.” 

The poor deaf man could only stare and protest in 
wonder, but soon a ponderous German puffed up 
the stairs in great excitement. He pulled the un¬ 
fortunate victim back among the heaps of properties 
and roared, shaking his fist: 

“I am the cornetist what plays here! What do 
you mean, you impostor, who try to take my place?” 

After they had succeeded in pacifying the German 
they explained to the deaf man. They had engaged 
a celebrated cornet soloist for the benefit concert, 
and had sent a reception committee to the station to 
meet him. It was late, and these nervous men had 
never seen the great musician. They did see a dig¬ 
nified man carrying what looked like a case for 
musical instruments. When they asked him if he 
was Professor Hoffman, the deaf man merely nodded 
his head as the quickest way to get rid of them, and 
they naturally rushed him to the theater without 
further ado, leaving the musician to find his way 
alone. 


218 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


This deaf man had a keen sense of humor, and 
greatly relished the situation, but the German had 
never recognized a joke in his life, so he continued 
to glare at the “impostor.” After a most humble 
apology about all the committee could offer as re¬ 
compense was an invitation to the deaf man to re¬ 
main and hear the music. He remained and was in¬ 
terested in seeing his musical rival blow himself up 
to nearly twice his natural size in order properly to 
express his feelings through his cornet. 

Many of his most amusing and at the same time 
tragic experiences come to the deaf man through his 
association with drunken people. We meet them in 
all our travels, and I must confess that I have never 
found a more interesting study than that which deals 
with the effect of alcohol upon the human character. 
A drunken deaf man is a most pitiable object, but 
to the observant deaf man his drunken neighbor 
presents a case of infinite wonder and variety. We 
see men naturally grim and silent singing ridiculous 
songs, or attempting to dance. Men usually profane, 
making no pretense at religion, suddenly quote from 
the Scriptures devoutly. Quarrelsome men of rough, 
ugly temper overwhelm us with attentions, while 
men of kindly nature challenge us to fight. We see 
it all, and must judge such people mainly by their 
actions. 

Usually drunken men begin to talk to me. When 
they find that I do not reply they generally foam 


CASES OF MISTAKEN IDENTITY 


219 


over with sorrow or anger, and it is hard to decide 
which is the more embarrassing. Once in a strange 
town when I was looking about for my friends the 
town drunkard accosted me. I have never known 
just what he did want, but when I explained that I 
was a stranger looking for a certain street he volun¬ 
teered to show me the way. So he caught mv arm 
and led me up the street, staggering against me at 
every other step, and talking loudly. And on our 
way we met my friend and his wife, sober and dig¬ 
nified persons who were horrified at my appearance 
under the escort of the town drunkard. In his sober 
moments my guide would never have thought of as¬ 
sociating with these aristocratic representatives of 
Main Street, but now he greeted them jovially, as 
old friends. It was a most embarassing situation, 
and my friends, being absolutely devoid of humor, 
have never felt quite sure of me since the incident. 

A drunken man once approached a friend of mine 
with a remark which he did not understand, as he 
was deaf, so he merely shook his head and turned 
away. The intoxicated man, full of fight, followed, 
shouting challenges and pulling off his coat. A 
crowd gathered about them, and two rough-looking 
fellows got behind the deaf man and offered to act 
as his seconds. One of them advised: 

“Give him an upper cut on the chin whisker and 
follow it up with one on his basket!” 

What the deaf man did was to pull out his note- 


220 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


book and pencil and give them to the drunken man, 
who now was quite ready for the fray. 

“I cannot hear a word you say. Write it out for 
me!” 

This is offered as a suggestion to the peace-makers, 
that they may be more blessed than ever before. 
Whenever a man curses you, and you want to gain 
time—ask him to write it out! Here the drunken 
man looked curiously at the deaf man and then at 
the notebook. He pondered deeply for a moment 
and then slowly began to put on his coat. He walked 
unsteadily to a little box nearby, mounted it care¬ 
fully and delivered a short speech something like 
this: 

“Ladies and gentlemen, I am wrong. This man is 
not my enemy, but my friend, made so through 
affliction. He is in need. I suggest that we all chip 
in and help him on his way. I’ll start with the 
price of three drinks! Come now, loosen up! He 
who giveth let him give quickly!” 

Once I lived in the house with a kindly man who 
had a fierce craving for drink. He really fought 
against it, but it mastered him again and again. One 
year at Christmas he had gone for several months 
without drinking. He was like a consumptive who 
imagines that he has overcome his disease while it 
still lurks within only waiting for favorable condi 
tions to blaze up. A few days before Christmas sev¬ 
eral old friends stepped out of his wild past and 


CASES OF MISTAKEN IDENTITY 


221 


broke down the man’s self-control. When I came 
home he was “roaring drunk”—I had never seen him 
in worse condition. As I came up the stairs he 
rushed suddenly out of his room and caught m» 
unexpectedly by the collar. As I was taken off m\ 
guard he was able to pull me inside the room, shut 
the door and throw himself against it. At that time 
I could hear much of what he said. He glared at 
me like a maniac. His fists were clenched, his eyes 
were bloodshot and he was altogether a terrifying 
and a pitiful spectacle. 

I expected him to throw himself upon me, and I 
was ready. I had no idea wherein I had offended, 
and I did not want to hurt him. I derided that when 
he sprang at me I would sidestep and give him the 
“French trip” which I had learned in the lumber 
camps. That will floor anyone who is not prepared 
for it, and I knew that I could tie him if necessary. 
But there was no fight in him except the frightful 
battle he was waging against himself. His fists 
opened and he held out his hands appealingly. 

“I’ve ’brought you here to pray for me! Get right 
down on your knees and pray that I may be a man 
and not a skunk!” 

Well—take it as you like, the deaf man has his 
share of excitement with all sorts of men. There 
seems to be no good reason that we should lead un¬ 
eventful lives! I have often wondered what various 
pompous friends of mine would have done with the 


222 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


above situation. Or I should like to see them mas¬ 
ter another incident which involved the same man. 
Once he approached me as I stood talking with 
visitors. 

“I want you to do me a favor !” he said in the thick, 
eager voice of the intoxicated. “I want you to kick 
me, and kick me hard!” As I did not reply he thought 
I had not heard, so taking off his coat he backed up 
to me in a way any deaf person could understand! 


CHAPTER XV 


All in a Lieftime 

The Training School for Robbers—Eavesdroppers Who 
Heard Not a Word—The Fox and the Wolf—The Mur¬ 
derer—The Plans for Eloping—Regarding the Deaf as 
Uncanny—The Narrowness and Prejudice of the Deaf 
Themselves—Dancing and Singing Eliminated—The Blind 
and the Deaf, and the Man with Both Afflictions. 

On a lonely corner in New York City I once saw 
three boys practicing the gentle art of highway 
robbery. One played the part of victim; he walked 
along giving a good imitation of the ordinary citizen 
busy with his own thoughts, giving little attention 
to his surroundings. The other two boys approached 
him carelessly, apparently laughing at some joke. 
As they passed, one of the “robbers” suddenly turned 
and threw his left arm around the “citizen’s” head 
just below the chin. Then he quickly slid his right 
arm down to pinion the arms of the victim just above 
the elbow. He put his left knee at the middle of the 
victim’s back and pulled with the left arm. It was 
a murderous grip; the more the victim struggled 
the closer drew the “head lock” under his chin, and 
the neck was forced back to the breaking point. The 
other boys deftly emptied the unprotected pockets 
of watch and money. Then they threw the victim 
to the ground and ran away. They rehearsed this 

223 . - 


224 ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 

over and over—taking turns at the different posi¬ 
tions, perfecting themselves in this barbarous busi¬ 
ness. 

I watched this fascinating play for some time, 
studying to think of some way in which the victim 
might defend himself. He might possibly use his 
feet, but taken unaware probably his breath would 
be shut off before he could organize any defense. 
One can easily realize how powerless an unsuspect¬ 
ing stranger wmuld be at the hands of three trained 
villains such as these boys seemed likely to become. 

Two years later I had occasion to pass through 
the street where this rogue’s training had been car¬ 
ried on. It was after dark, and just as my mind re¬ 
verted to this grewsome drill two men appeared from 
under the shadow of the elevated station. They 
stopped and spoke to me, but I did not understand. 
One of them repeated his question, pointing at my 
watch chain. Naturally I pulled back my arm to 
strike him as I saw an opening, but the other man 
quickly caught my head and arms in that murder¬ 
ous lock which I had seen those boys practicing. He 
did not hurt me, but I found myself powerless to 
move or speak. I cannot describe the feeling of 
utter helplessness caused by that grip at my throat 
and arms. The first man took my watch from my 
pocket and held it to the light, looked at it care¬ 
fully —and put it l)ack again! He looked over my 
shoulder at his companion who held me captive, and 


ALL IN A LIFETIME 225 

as liis face was then in the light, I could read the 
words on his lips: 

“Only nine o’clock?” 

Then I read once more: 

“Thank you!” 

My arms were set free, and, smiling, the two men 
hurried on. I assume that they merely wanted to 
know the time. They saw that I could not hear them 
and that I might call for help and put them in a bad 
position, so they helped themselves to the time of 
day in true hold-up style. 

One man’s adventure illustrates how deafness may 
be converted into an asset if the affliction can be 
kept concealed. He went to a city park, and was 
sitting on a bench which was partly concealed by 
trees and shrubs. He was undergoing one of those 
periods of depression which often fall upon us in 
the silence, after some sharp rebuff, or when the real 
trouble of our affliction is visited upon us by some 
careless associate. Completely absorbed, this man 
did not notice that a nearby seat was occupied by a 
young woman and a man. Finally he did perceive 
that they were talking earnestly—the man was 
evidently pleading and the woman was inclined to 
deny him. But at last she evidently consented to 
his proposition, and he looked cautiously around to 
make sure that they were alone before sealing the 
agreement in the usual way. Then for the first time 
he discovered my deaf friend within ten feet of their 


226 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


bench! Of course these young people assumed that 
the deaf man had heard it all. From the beginning 
conscience has made cowards of most of us. The 
girl started to advertise her feelings with a scream, 
but her companion checked her just in time by point¬ 
ing to a park policeman who was swinging his club 
at the corner of the path. Then he took out his note¬ 
book, and without trying to talk he wrote this brief 
explanation and handed it to the deaf man. 

“Please don’t betrav us. It is true that we have 
planned to elope. We will be married this after¬ 
noon in New Jersey. I am sure her father will for¬ 
give us when we return; it is our only way. You 
overheard by accident—now be a good sport and let 
us alone!” 

The deaf man put on his glasses to read the note. 
Through the film which gathered on the lenses he 
saw only visions of youth and romance. No woman 
would be likely to come into the land of silence and 
elope with him! That would be but a clumsy and 
ridiculous performance, and he knew it well. These 
young people were probably all wrong. Yonder 
policeman would question them, find where they 
lived and notify the father of the girl. As a sober 
minded citizen opposed to youthful folly and far re¬ 
moved from it, was it not his duty to stop such 
nonsense? And yet— 

He who hesitates is frequently spared the neces¬ 
sity for decision. He looked up to find that the young 


ALL IN A LIFETIME 


227 


people bad disappeared, they had slipped out of 
sight during his meditation. And in his lonely 
silence the deaf man could smile, for he was glad 
that they got away. 

Another deaf man was traveling through a West¬ 
ern State in a Pullman. This man noticed two men 
who seemed to be engaged in a most earnest dis¬ 
cussion. They sat across the aisle from him and as 
«/ 

they talked they glanced furtively about. They were 
a forbidding pair, one a great hulking brute with a 
broad red face—the other a little rat of a man with 
a low, receding forehead and a bright, restless eye. 
The wolf and the fox appeared to be hunting to¬ 
gether. Frequently the big man became emphatic 
and struck the back of the seat with his great fist 
while the little man shook his head and bared his 
teeth in a smile which seemed like a menace. The 
deaf man wished to change his position so as to get 
a better view of the country, and he happened to 
drop into the seat which backed up against the one 
in which the wolf and the fox were laying their 
plans. At first they paid no attention to him, but 
continued to argue and gesticulate. Finally the 
fox realized that the head of the deaf man was 
within a foot of their conversation. How was he 
to know that the “listener” might as well have been 
a mile away in so far as successful eavesdropping 
was concerned? He instantly signalled to the wolf 
and the discussion stopped. They both soon moved 



228 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


to the smoking-room, where they whispered lor a 
little time; then the fox came to sit beside the deaf 
man. He glanced about anxiously, but finally said: 

“Did you happen to hear what we were saying?” 

The “eavesdropper” read some of the words on the 
lips of the other, and vaguely nodded his head. Then 
the fox took a piece of paper and wrote: 

“It is a good joke. I made a bet with my friend 
that we could make you think we were in earnest in 
planning the job. Of course there is nothing to it. 
It was a fake talk.” 

Just then the wolf appeared with his hat and suit¬ 
case. The train was approaching a small town. 
“Come,” he said, “we get out here.” His friend 
jumped up to join him. They sprang off as the train 
stopped, though the conductor said that their tickets 
would have carried them fifty miles farther. The 
deaf man caught a look of fear and suspicion from 
the fox as the two disappeared. Of course they 
were planning mischief, but fear of this deaf man 
caused them to run from him as they would have 
fled a plague. 

Many years ago I passed a Winter in a lumber 
camp far up among the snows of Northern Michigan. 
My bunk-mate was a gigantic, silent man, a stranger 
and a mystery to all the rest of us. He said little 
and made no friends. He had a curious habit of 
glancing hurriedly about him; he started at light 
sounds and appeared to keep a watchful eye always 


ALL IN A LIFETIME 


229 


upon the door. Frequently at night I found him 
awake, gazing at the lantern which always hung at 
the door, near the end of the camp. One day the 
driver of the supply team smuggled a bottle of 
whiskey into camp and my bunk-mate was able to 
get two good drinks. We worked together that day 
in a lonely place, and he became quite talkative. I 
could not hear him well, but he was evidently trying 
to tell some incident of his own life. There in the 
forest, knee deep in snow, he appeared to be acting 
out a tragedy. At the last he did not seem to realize 
that I was there. He addressed some imaginary per¬ 
son, holding out his hands as if in appeal. Appar¬ 
ently this was rejected, and his face changed in 
anger. He caught up his axe and rushed up to a 
fallen log; he struck it a blow which sent a great 
chip flying a hundred feet away. Then he looked 
at me in wonder, seeming to realize that I must 
have overheard him. He sat on the log, took great 
handfuls of snow and held them against his head. 
I found myself helping him with a great chunk of 
ice which I had brought from the brook. 

“It was the whiskey,” he suddenly shouted. “It’s 
poison. It makes me talk and think. Say—did you 
hear what I said? What was it?” 

He looked at me with hard, savage eyes. I had 
not heard his ravings and did not recount his ac¬ 
tions. He continued to stare at me silently, axe in 
hand. Then he decided to believe my denial and he 



230 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


kept at work as before, silent and grim. As we 
went back to camp that night he asked me once more, 
with apparent irrelevance: 

“Did you hear what I said ?” 

I again assured him that I had understood noth¬ 
ing, which was the truth. He seemed satisfied, but 
during the evening he divided his attention between 
me and the outside door; he was again puzzled over 
the chance that I had heard. In the early morning 
I awoke to find myself alone in the bunk. The man 
did not appear again. 

Two nights later I sat on the bench by the camp 
strove drying my clothes after another day in the wet 
snow. At the moment when I was remembering that 
curious watch-dog habit of my bunk-mate’s the door 
suddenly opened and two men entered. One was 
the sheriff of a county in the lower tier, near the 
Ohio line; the other was also armed. They were 
after my bunk-mate—too late. 

“What’s it for?” asked the foreman. 

“Murder, I reckon. He quarreled with his wife 
and hit her with an axe.” 

And to this day I wonder what would have hap¬ 
pened to me in the woods if I had heard what he 
said. 

Deaf persons undoubtedly come to be really trou¬ 
blesome to many kindly and essentially generous 
men and women. I have never been able to under¬ 
stand the feeling; perhaps it resembles the creepy 


ALL IN A LIFETIME 


231 


terror which the touch or the sight of a cat arouses 
in some persons. Any any rate I have been intro¬ 
duced to people who are unmistakably afraid of me. 
They cross the street to avoid a face-to-face en¬ 
counter. I think they would not dare to walk alone 
with me at night. I have come to realize that a fair 
proportion of the human beings I meet are actually 
afraid of me, or uncomfortable in my presence until 
I in some way make them understand that I will not 
annoy them, or that I have a message for them which 
can be delivered by no one else. Some deaf people 
live tormented by the thought that society rejects 
them, or at best merely tolerates them. They would 
be far happier to admit frankly that they are not as 
other men, and realize that there is no reason why 
the world should give them special accommodation. 
They should rather seek to acquire original per¬ 
sonality or power which would make them so lumi¬ 
nous that the world would eagerly follow them. This 
is possible in some way for every deaf person. It is 
our best hope. 

One of the finest men I ever knew told me frankly 
that two classes of people make him shudder; men 
belonging to the Salvation Army, in uniform, and 
deaf persons, trying to hear. This friend is a thor¬ 
oughly sincere clergyman, with a leaning toward 
the full dignity of the cloth. The Salvation Army 
came to his town, and being charitably disposed 
toward the workers, he attended one of their meet- 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


23 2 


ings. Greatly to his embarrassment the captain 
called in a loud voice for Brother Johnson to pray. 
The clergyman started in the formal manner but at 
the first period he was greeted with a loud chorus—■ 
“Amen, brother!” while the drummer pounded on 
Ins drum and clashed his brass. My friend still suf¬ 
fers from the shock. His feeling for the deaf may be 
traced to Aunt Sallie. At the bedside of a sick 
friend he was asked to pray. Before he could even 
start Aunt Sallie, very deaf but anxious to miss 
nothing, planted herself so close as to place her ear 
about six inches from his mouth. I do not wonder 
that this man will cross the street at the approach 
of deafness or a uniformed Salvation Army officer. 

And it must be admitted that it is quite easy for 
the deaf themselves to become narrow and preju¬ 
diced. Frequently when exiled to the silent world, 
with poetry and laughter shut out, we use a clipped 
yard stick to measure the good which is always to be 
found in everyone. Sometimes prejudice is carried 
to a ridiculous extreme. When I was a boy Deacon 
Drake of the Congregational Church went to a 
funeral at which a Unitarian minister officiated. The 
Deacon had not heard for years, but he sat stiff¬ 
necked and solemn until the choir sang a hymn 
which visibly affected the people. He asked his 
daughter for the name of the hymn and she wrote 
it out—“Nearer, My God, to Thee.” The old man 
had heard not a note, but as he disapproved of the 


ALL IN A LIFETIME 


sentiment expressed lie rose and tramped firmly onl 
of the room. 

Job asked “Where is wisdom to be found?” Surely 
the deaf may eliminate singing and dancing as 
promising prospects for their search! Once a deaf 
man went to a party and fell into the hands of a 
feminine “joker.” This lady had wagered that she 
could dance a Virginia reel with a man unable to 
hear a note of the music. She contended that she 
would make him hear through vibration and thus 
guide him properly. Of course the deaf man knew 
better, but what was he to do? What could any 
man do in such a case? You yourself would prob¬ 
ably trample all over judgment and common sense 
and stand out to make yourself ridiculous as man 
has done for centuries, and will doubtless continue 
to do! 

They started bravely, but half way down the line 
the music quickened and the ill-starred deaf man 
landed heavily upon the foot of his partner. It was 
a cruel smash. The vibration process was reversed. 
She lost her wager and he was counted out, but he 
should have known better. 

Perhaps you have seen a deaf man trying to march 
in a parade; I once saw one trying to keep step to 
his own wedding march! Well, I may say that the 
wife of a deaf man has many trials, usually she must 
do the marching for both. 

I have often been asked whether total deafness is 


234 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


a greater affliction than total blindness. It would 
be very difficult to decide. At times the blind man 
would gladly exchange his hearing for sight; he so 
longs to see the faces of old friends or of his chil¬ 
dren. Yet frequently he is glad that the burden of 
deafness has not been laid upon him. In like man¬ 
ner the deaf man would sometimes give all he has 
for the sound of some familiar voice or the melody 
of some old song. l r et, considering carefully and 
weighing all the evidence, total blindness seems the 
greater affliction. But I have had blind men “feel 
sorry” for me because I miss the sounds of the birds 
and cannot hear whispered confidences. 

However, I think the blind are happier than the 
deaf. There is less of the torture of Tantalus about 
their affliction. If they are surrounded by loving 
and considerate friends they have less to regret than 
the deaf; their embarrassments are not brought 
home so cruelly, for they do not see the consequences 
of their own blunders. I know a woman who was 
suddenly blinded, twenty-five years ago. She has 
lived usefully and happily with her family. Her 
children are now middle-age men and women, show¬ 
ing the wrinkles and the wear of life. Her husband 
and her brother have aged, but not for her. She 
only sees the old vision of youth and power. An 
illuminated silence would have given her all the 
signs of age creeping upon those nearest her, and 
would have destroyed her intimate part in the every- 


ALL IN A LIFETIME 


235 


day family life. Her children never could have come 
to her, weeping, seeking her sacred confidences, had 
she been unable to hear them. 

Society has a more kindly feeling for the blind 
man than for the deaf—at least so it seems to us. 
You may find a good illustration of this at some 
party or social gathering in the country. The neigh¬ 
bors gather; very likely it is Winter and they come 
from lonely places, eager for human companionship. 
It is a jolly gathering. Perhaps a blind man and a 
deaf man of equal social importance, will enter the 
room simultaneously. The blind man hears the 
\aughter and the happy chatter and at once enters 
into the spirit of the evening. The deaf man catches 
no happy contagion, he feels a melancholy irritation. 
He would have been far happier at home with his 
book, but his wife and daughter urged upon him the 
duty of coming to “enjoy himself” and—here he is. 

Half a dozen people rush to the blind man. He 
must be guided to a comfortable seat where a willing 
interpreter will quickly make him feel at home. He 
is told about the new red dress which Mrs. Jones is 
wearing, it is so becoming! Miss Foster is in blue, 
and her hair is arranged in the latest New York 
style. Henry Benson has shaved off his beard. John 
Mercer has a bandage on his hand where he cut it 
with the saw. The Chase girls have new fur coats. 
The blind man sees it through the eyes of his neigh¬ 
bor. It is a pleasure to sit unobtrusively and talk 


236 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


to him—it gives one a thrill of satisfaction to feel 
that the blind man is made happy. 

But who rushes to the deaf man for the privilege 
of being his interpreter? In all my experience I 
have known only one person to do this. As he looks 
about him for a vacant seat the deaf man sees few 
inviting hands or faces. If he is able to read facial 
expressions at all he soon fancies that there are 
many versions of the thought: 

“Oh, I hope that man will not sit near me !” 

Who desires to attract attention by screaming at 
the deaf man or to spend the evening writing out for 
him what others are saying? 

A little handful of people once attended a prayer 
meeting at a little country church back among the 
hills. It was during a severe, gloomy Winter, a 
season of unusual trouble and unusual complaint. 
The little stove could barely melt the thick frost 
on the windows. The feeble lamps gave but a dim 
light. Yet as the meeting progressed through prayer 
and song that melancholy group of farmers mel¬ 
lowed, and undoubtedly something of holy joy came 
to them. I, of course, heard not a word of the serv¬ 
ice, but apparently each person waited for the spirit 
to move them, then rose and repeated some well- 
worn prayer or a verse of Scripture. It was utterly 
crude and simple, but a certain power fell upon that 
company and for the moment it was lifted out of 
the dull commonplace of daily life. Little or noth- 


ALL IN A LIFETIME 


237 


ing of the spiritual uplift came to me. At the close 
of the service I saw people who had come gloomy 
and depressed acting like happy children, shaking 
hands, forgetting old troubles, buoyed and braced. 
And some of them seemed to regard my calmness 
with wonder—I could not fully join in their happi¬ 
ness. 

It is evident that a sincere religious spirit can 
bring great comfort to the deaf. Now and then I 
find a deaf man who practices what I call profes¬ 
sional religion with all the cant and the pious 
phrases necessary. It never seems to ring true. The 
deaf are notorious failures at deception. But a firm 
trust in God and a sincere belief in His power and 
mercy should be “As the shadow of a mighty rock 
in a weary land”—of silence. We must have the 
best possible moral support. 

I know of a man who is both blind and deaf. Once 
v hen I gave way momentarily to depression his wife 
wrote me: 

“I felt like writing an invitation to you to come 
and look at my husband who is both blind and deaf. 
An accident twenty-one years ago caused the loss of 
sight, which came on gradually but finally became 
complete. When I told him you were to write 
“Adventures in Silence,” he said, ‘Why not the won¬ 
ders of silence and darkness?’ That has been his at¬ 
titude all through these burdened years. These are 
but a small portion of the misfortunes and trials 


238 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


which have befallen us, but as he guides himself by 
lines hung from one point to another just high 
enough to take the crook of his cane there comes 
never a word of discouragement or despair. Here 
let me say that an educated, trained mind is the 
finest gift you can give to your children. It is the 
possession of a wonderful mind well trained by a 
splendid education that has been next to God’s love 
that has kept ‘my man’ upright and strong through 
the darkened and silent valley.” 

We may all of us readily understand that no hu¬ 
man or material power is strong enough to sustain 
a man through such a fate. 


CHAPTER XVI 


“Such Tricks Hath Strong Imagination” 

Imaginary Fears, Stuffed Lions and Bogus “Wild Men”— 
Sound as Stimulating Emotions, Even of Animals—The 
Brazen Courage of the Deaf—The Rum-crazed Men— 
The Overflowing Brook—The Drunken Prizefighter Chal¬ 
lenged by a Deaf Man—The Terrors Lurking Within— 
Demons of Depression—The Deaf Man and the Only Girl, 

Most of our fears are imaginary. I am convinced 
of this after a long study of deaf people, and a care¬ 
ful analysis of my own experience in the silence. I 
believe that physical fear is almost invariably in¬ 
duced by sound. We all see lions in the way. The 
man with good ears hears the roaring and hesitates, 
or turns aside. The horrible sound does not reach 
the deaf man, and he feels more inclined to go ahead 
and investigate. Most frequently the frightful object 
turns out to be a stuffed lion, a creature without ef¬ 
fective claws or teeth, with nothing but wind in its 
roaring! 

With a little thought every man can remember in¬ 
cidents which tend to prove this statement, but in 
time of threatened danger he is likely to forget them. 
Years ago in my boyhood days a couple of us young¬ 
sters went to a circus in the country town. In one 

239 


240 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


of the side-shows was a fierce-looking creature la¬ 
belled “The Wild Man of Borneo.” It appeared to 
be a human being of medium size with long claws, 
rolling eyes, and a dreadful, discolored, hairy coun¬ 
tenance. His most frightful characteristic was his 
voice, which was exhibited by a horrible roar, a 
sound well calculated to chill the simple hearts of 
the country people who listened to the “manager’s” 
tale of a thrilling capture. There had been a bloody 
fight in which the wild man had killed several dogs 
and wounded a number of hunters. He would never 
have surrendered had they not first captured his 
mate; he followed her into voluntary slavery—“Thus 
proving that love is the primal and ruling force of 
the universe. The love-song of this devoted couple, 
ringing over the hills and dales, would have daunted 
the stoutest heart.” In proof of which the two 
caged creatures started a chorus of roars which 
would have sent the country people home to shudder 
in the darkness, had not a very practical deaf man 
been moved to investigate. He heard nothing of the 
explanation, and but little of the roaring; he only 
saw a couple of undersized creatures, exceedingly 
dirty and not particularly interesting. The “love 
song” gave them no glamour for him. So he idly 
lifted a curtain which hung at one corner of the 
tent, and, lo, the fountain of sound was revealed at 
its true source. A hot and perspiring fat man was 
working industriously at the pedal of a “wind ma- 


“such tricks hath strong imagination” 241 

chine,” a device resembling an old-fashioned parlor 
organ. Here was the real explanation of those primi¬ 
tive cries proving the deep affection which the “Wild 
Man of Borneo” felt for his mate. The deaf man 
pulled the curtain completely down and exposed the 
humbug. 

Well, it broke up the show! Next to the fury of 
a woman scorned is the wrath of a crowd of country 
people who have paid their money for a thrill only 
tc find themselves served with a very thin trick. They 
see no humor in the situation, and an exposure of 
this sort is a cruel blow at their pride and judgment. 
People with humor and philosophy would have 
laughed at the joke and polished it up for the bene¬ 
fit of their friends, but this hard-headed, serious folk 
could only find relief by pulling down the tent. In 
a far larger way this is what the solid, unreasoning 
and unimaginative element of a population will do 
to a state or a national government when some po¬ 
litical trick has been exposed. 

It was the “wild man” himself who saved the sit¬ 
uation in the circus tent, and tamed the outraged 
audience. He pulled off his wig and beard and shed 
flie claws which were fitted to his fingers like gloves. 
Then there stood revealed a small Irishman with a 
freckled, good-natured face. 

“Sure,” he said, “the game’s up and I”m glad, be¬ 
cause it's a tiresome job. I’ve worked on a farm in 


242 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


my day, and I’d like to do it again. If any of you 
farmers here will give me a job, I’ll take it.” 

“And me, too!” said the “mate”; when “her” 
frowsy head dress came off there was a red-haired 
young fellow of pleasant countenance. They both 
got farm jobs and lived in that community for 
several years. The “mate” finally married a farmer’s 
daughter! 

It has been said that the primary effect of sound 
i* the creating of moods; psychologists have spent 
much time in analyzing the connection between 
sound and fear and kindred emotions. It is easy 
enough to realize that sight must inform or directly 
affect the intellect. Theater managers prove the ne¬ 
cessity of supplementing sight with sound when they 
obtain a full play of emotion by giving the audience 
appropriate music, which they stress during emo¬ 
tional passages. Perhaps what we are is determined 
by what we see, while what we feel is decided by 
what we hear. The deaf are frequently termed hard¬ 
hearted and even cold-blooded. I have known deaf 
pei sons actually to smile at cases of grief or injury 
which seemed tragic to those who could hear what 
the unfortunate victims were saying. They saw only 
tbe physical contortions. Suppose you with good 
cars and I in my silence, walking together, meet a 
little crying child. I can only observe the outward 
signs of distress; I see her tears and watch the lit¬ 
tle chest rise and fall with her sobs. My sympathy 


“such tricks hath strong imagination” 243 


can be only vague and general—I may even smile to 
myself over the shallow sorrows of childhood. It 
will pay you to stoop over and hear the whole story, 
1o catch every tone of the little, grief-stricken voice. 
I have no means of offering intelligent consolation, 
perhaps you can explain the trouble away or offer 
a quick diversion. 

There are hundreds of instances where the deaf 
have undergone battles, shipwrecks or other fright¬ 
ful adventures with composure, while their compan¬ 
ions were stumbling or jabbering with fear. These 
latter w T ould tell you that the most horrible part of 
their experience was the cries of the suffering who 
faced death in agony and fear. The mere spectacle 
of the suffering did not upset the cool judgment of 
the deaf. 

It seems evident that sound also has a greater 
stimulating effect upon the emotions of animals than 
do the other senses. A friend who has studied this 
subject says: 

“I have imitated different animals many thousand 
times, and can easily deceive them at their own 
game, but cannot long deceive the average person. 
A dog relying on sight, smell and hearing—and may¬ 
be a little, a very little reasoning—although he may 
be very brave—can easily be made to flee in terror 
by the right sort of growding and noises connecting 
first w r onder, then anger or terror. He hears a very 
ferocious dog, but can neither see nor smell him; 



244 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


here is something new, which he cannot reason out— 
he curls his tail, gives a frightened yelp, registers 
fear in other ways and runs with all his might. 

“Recently I was out hunting wild turkeys, and 
had nearly induced one to come near to me when a 
stick fell from a tree, and without waiting to reason, 
away he went. My call would not deceive a person, 
but any sort of an amateur squawk easily deceives a 
gobbler. Not long ago, a friend of mine, while call¬ 
ing a gobbler, called also a wildcat who was trying 
to get the gobbler for breakfast. Animal sight may 
be ultra-human, but 1 am very sure that animal hear¬ 
ing is not.” 

Doubtless we all rely on hearing to keep us in¬ 
formed concerning the fear instinct. Children hear 
a great deal subjectively, aided by their fears plus 
imagination. I am almost prepared to state that 
deafness is connected with fearlessness above the 
average, but I am not yet sure of my ground. Any 
defect of the five senses strengthens in a measure 
the remaining channels, and deafness cannot but 
assist concentration in those persons of studious 
contemplative habit, since it closes one avenue of in¬ 
terruption. I have noticed that with those of a 
philosophical turn plus strong will—or won’t—deaf¬ 
ness saves nerve fatigue, from hearing many noises 
or remarks. 

I have observed the habits of several deaf cats and 
dogs, and have noted instances of exceptional 


“such tricks hath strong imagination” 245 

bravery, and evidences of a new sense, probably the 
substitute for the one they have lost. Some of my 
own experiences also show how sound dominates 
physical tear. 

During my Winter in a large lumber camp of 
Northern Michigan I found how far life can swing 
from the ideal republic even in this country. The 
snow T had shut in our little community for the Win¬ 
ter. The majority of our choppers were French 
Canadians and Swedes, strains of humanity which 
are completely unlike until whiskey breeds in both 
a desire to fight and kill. In some way the Cana¬ 
dians had obtained a supply of “white whiskey” (a 
mixture of grain alcohol and water) at Christmas, 
and the entire outfit prepared to celebrate gloriously. 
The boss prepared to follow Grant’s famous plan of 
campaign. He cut off the enemy’s base of supplies 
by locking the door of the cook’s shanty and refus¬ 
ing to feed the rioters. This brought the revolution 
to a head. A crowd of savage men gathered in front 
ol the buildings with their axes, and threatened to 
cut the doors out and to kill the few of us who were 
left on guard. After it was all over I was told that 
the cursing and the threatening of these rum-crazed 
men was frightful, but as I could not hear a syllable 
of it I walked up to them, entered the group and 
talked the situation over with French Charlie, Joe 
the Devil and the Blue Swede. The rest of my side 
expected to see me chopped into pieces, but most men 


246 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


who threaten before they act will talk a full diction¬ 
ary before they kill. These drunken men were so 
astonished at a deaf man’s disregard of their threats 
that they were diverted from their anger, and I was 
able to make terms with them. I probably should 
not have dared to go near them if I had received the 
curses and threats direct. 

Years later a sudden cloudburst in the hills above 
our farm filled the streams to overflowing. The lit¬ 
tle river near our home jumped out of its bed and 
spread over the road—a rushing, roaring, shallow 
sheet of water. I had to cross that part of the road 
in order to get my train, and I took a steady horse, 
with one of the little boys in the buggy with me. At 
the edge of this overflow we found a group of ex¬ 
cited men who were listening to the roaring, and 
were afraid to venture over. I used my eyes calmly 
and observed that the bridge was quite sound, and 
the water was too shallow to be really dangerous. So 
in I drove with my boy—who was white with terror 
—while most of the men tried to stop me. The old 
horse waded calmly and safely, and we crossed with¬ 
out trouble. The water never reached the hub of 
the wheel! Yet 011 the other side men stood half par¬ 
alyzed because they heard the roaring water and 
stopped to listen. On the other side my boy said, 
“But you never would have done it if you could hear 
that water!” 

As I look from the silent land out into the busy 


“such tricks hath strong imagination” 247 

world I see men hesitate, falter and fall back at ter¬ 
rors which appear to me imaginary. They stop to 
listen —and are lost. Like my boy on the edge of 
the river, they hear the roaring water and become 
unfit for calm judgment, or keen analysis of actual 
danger. Most people with good hearing stop too 
frequently to listen. A scarecrow may have been 
making a noise like a fighting man! If you listen 
long enough to the tales of a liar you will come to 
regard him as a lion. 

A friend of mine relates a strange adventure which 
befell him on a New York subway train. He was a 
‘‘strap-hanger” in a crowded express car rushing up 
town. As is the habit of the deaf he forgot the 
throng around him and let his mind become absorbed 
in the business he was engaged in. This is the 
privilege of us deaf; we may be near enough to a 
dozen men to touch them with our hands, yet the 
mind can take us miles away from all distractions. 
This man was rudely shaken from his oblivion by a 
great commotion in the car. The passengers rushed 
forward past him, stumbling over each other in their 
eagerness to get away to the front of the train. Two 
so-called “guards” fled with the rest. The deaf man 
did not join the stampede because he had no idea 
what it was all about, and long experience of the 
vagaries of people who can hear had taught him the 
wisdom of keeping out of the rush. He glanced over 
his shoulder and saw that the back of the car was 
empty save for one man, who stood quite near to 


248 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


him. This was a thick-set individual with a small, 
bullet-shaped head, set firmly on a bull neck. He 
had a heavy red face, and small, deep-set eyes, but 
his most singular feature was his right ear—it did 
not look human at all, but resembled a small cauli¬ 
flower. The eyes of the deaf are quick to seize upon 
the most unusual or conspicuous part of an object— 
my deaf friend noted first of all that cauliflower ear. 

Its owner advanced and shook his fist menacingly, 
shouting words which only served to increase the 
confusion of the stampeders. The deaf man merely 
hung to his strap and over his shoulder shouted into 
the cauliflower ear: 

‘‘Oh, shut up! Give us a rest!” 

The “guard’’ who was Hying to jam through the 
door nearly fell with astonishment. As the man 
continued to approach from behind, the deaf man 
turned and pointed a finger at him. 

“I can't hear a word you say, and I don’t know 
who you are—but shut up, and stop your noise!” 

The antagonist glanced sharply at him—then the 
deaf man read on his lips: 

“Don't you know who I am ?” 

“Xo, and I don't care!” 

“Can’t you hear what I sav?” 

%j 

“Xo, and I don't want to! Mind your own busi¬ 
ness !” 

The bullet-headed man uttered one short expres- 
Mve word and sat down. At Forty-second Street 


“such tricks hath strong imagination” 249 

two good-sized policemen appeared, but they waited 
for reinforcements before arresting the disturber. 
However, he went willingly, casting back a look of 
mingled fear and admiration at the deaf man. My 
friend did not know he was a hero until he learned 
that the belligerent gentleman was a champion mid¬ 
dle-weight boxer, very drunk and very ugly. He 
had threatened to clean out the crowd—hence the 
sudden stampede. This deaf man tells me that if 
he had really known to whom the cauliflower ear 
belonged he would have been the first man out of 
the car. As it happened he gained a reputation for 
being the only man who ever told a “champ” to shut 
up, and then cooled him off by shaking a finger. I 
have known many deaf men who have escaped from 
such situations most marvelously uninjured. 

Yet while the deaf man is smiling at most of the 
terrors which approach him from without, he falls 
an easy prey to those which attack from within. 
Imagination will often lead a sensitive man into un¬ 
told misery. Our hardest struggles come when we 
must strangle the imps of depression, our personal 
devils. They come with evil suggestion, frequently 
with actual voices, eager to poison the will and para¬ 
lyze the courage. I have no doubt that Whittier’s 
great poem beginning: 

“Spare me, dread angel of reproach” 
was written as the result of subjective audition. I 
suppose the average person can never know how 


250 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


close the deaf are driven to temporary insanity in 
their struggles to overcome doubts and imaginary 
fears. Sometimes the fear concentrates upon the 
idea that they will lose sight as well as hearing! Or 
perhaps doubt of wife, children or friends will pre¬ 
sent itself forcibly. Little incidents, a feeling that 
people are laughing at their expense, some uninten¬ 
tional slight, a misunderstanding or a rude nervous 
shock, any of these may start the hateful imps which 
live in one part of the brain at their fearful work 
of poisoning the mind and the will. At times the 
deaf man finds it almost impossible to wrench free 
from these accursed influences. 

Some readers become so completely absorbed in 
books that they cannot take the mind from a sad or 
an exciting story. I have know deaf men to enter 
into such a story as George Eliot’s “Mill on the 
Floss so that they lived through the lives of the var¬ 
ious characters and found that they could not shake 
off the depression. Usually I can tell when the au¬ 
thor is deaf by the general character of the story. 
The dialogue is as a rule unnatural and the tone is 
apt to be gloomy. Music, or light, aimless conversa¬ 
tion would clear the mind and make the reader re¬ 
member that it is only a story—but to the deaf man, 
deprived of these aids, the tragedy depicted on the 
printed page becomes shockingly real. The best 
remedy for me is to “read in streaks.” Whenever I 
find that a book is liable to have this powerful effect 


“such tricks hath strong imagination” 251 

on me I do not read continuously, but after a few 
chapters I take up something in lighter vein, or even 
a serious volume of solid thought. Some of us deaf 
acquire a morbid desire to read sad or sombre litera¬ 
ture. This mistake should be overcome even if it re¬ 
quires a supreme effort. If one can acquire faith in 
the Bible and reverence for its teachings it will give 
greater comfort to the deaf than will any other book. 
I place Shakespeare next, then Milton and the other 
great poets. But let a deaf man read what interests 
him, if it be nothing but the local paper. If he lives 
in the country let him become a correspondent for 
his local paper, and join the hunt for local news. He 
should leave out of his list all tales of depression 
and sin. The deaf person should make a point of 
reading half a dozen of the “best sellers” each year. 
They are likely to be stories of human nature, and 
thev will undoubtedlv contain natural dialogue: 
these elements are sadly needed by the deaf, yet they 
are the least likely to come into the silent world. 

Of course you will contend, and truly, that it is 
supremely foolish for grown men and women to give 
way to imaginary fears and doubts. Yet the very 
absurdity makes it harder to bring cool reason into 
the fight against these imps. As Claude Melnotte in 
“The Lady of Lyons” puts it : 

“It is the sting of such a woe as mine 
To feel I am a man!” 

Again, my best remedy is to force the mind back- 


2$2 ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 

ward into familiar incidents which clearly show that 
these fierce lions of the imagination are at best mere 
scarecrows. There is one favorite adventure which 
usually serves to lift the spell. 

Many years ago a certain young man met a certain 
young woman, and the young man was soon com¬ 
pletely certain that here was “the only girl.” Ever 
since the world began young men have singled out 
young women by a process of selection, not usually 
scientific or always safe or sane; yet life has con¬ 
tinued for many centuries with upward tendencies 
as a result. This young man’s ancestor, the cave 
man, would doubtlessly have taken a club (if he had 
been big enough), knocked down the male members 
of the family, and dragged the young woman off to 
his own hole in the rocks. The race has progressed 
since then, and the family must be aproached in a 
more gentle manner. This young woman had a 
wide choice. She was bright and lively and 
pretty, with a long string of attendants. The 
man - was serious-minded and poor, with pros¬ 
pects far from the best. His hearing was failing, 
and he knew that deafness was inevitable. He had 
reasoned out the whole situation with the greatest 
care. Here was the “only girl,” but the cold future 
lay on ahead. Have the deaf a right to marry? Is 
it fair to ask anyone to share the results of such an 
affliction? What he did was to go straight to the 
01ll y girl ’ with the truth. Probably the imps of de- 


“such tricks hath strong imagination” 253 

pression had begun to talk to him even then. No 
doubt he made his future chances seem harder than 
he might have done. It is said that John G. Whittier 
made the same blunder of exaggerated honesty when 
he offered marriage to another “only girl.” The girl 
rejected him and W T hittier never married. But in 
our case the “only girl” said that she would “think 
it over.” 

Then came the lawn party. The young man was 
a little late, and dancing had begun when he came 
and looked through the window. Those were the 
good old Southern days when we swung about in the 
old-fashioned waltz; the happy days before the war 
were still in mind, and we danced to such plaintive 
tunes as “Old Kentucky Home,” and “Nellie W r as a 
Lady.” The young man outside saw the “only girl” 
dancing with Henry. Henry was a good fellow, 
bright and clean; his mother was the richest woman 
in town. When the music stopped the couple came 
out on to the lawn. The waiting young man saw 
them find seats under a tree, back from the lights, 
where they sat down to talk earnestly. The watcher 
could think of but one probable topic for conversa¬ 
tion. Once as he walked down a path under a lamp 
they looked at him and he saw r the “only girl” smile. 
He lost all interest in the party. He walked on out 
along the lonely country road, and like Philip Bay 
of Enoch Arden, “had his dark hour alone.” 

The imps came to him in the dark, but he mastered 


254 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


them and reasoned it out to a great peace. “It is 
Letter so. Henry can give her an easier life. She 
will be happier here in her old home town. I must 
fight for a place in the world, and she is not a 
fighter. I am handicapped. In the years to come, 
as a deaf man I shall be worse off than a man with 
one leg. I really have no right to ask her to share 
an uncertainty with me. Henry is the better man— 
and yet, she is the ‘only girl.’ I cannot stay here. 
Ill go back North!” 

The deaf spend less time on regrets after the strug¬ 
gle than do those who can hear. So the young man 
walked back to the house with a great peace in his 
heart. The “only girl” w r as sitting on the steps, one 
of a group of happy young people. And Henry came 
walking across the lawn straight to the deaf man. 
The latter braced himself and held out his hand to 
the rival—for what did it matter after all if the 
“only girl” could be satisfied? But Henry got in 
ahead. He put out his hand impulsively and*said: 

“Old man, I congratulate you! She has told me all 
about it. She’s not for me. She says she admires a 
self-made man, and that’s more than I can ever be. 
Mother took the job off my hands too early!” 

This is undoubtedly the best antidote for my fears 
and imaginary vagaries, and I like to pass it in 
mental review. And this lady who sits at the other 
side of the fire! I winder how much of it she re¬ 
members? Does it have the effect of an antidote for 


“such tricks hath strong imagination” 255 

her? She is writing something for me now. No 
doubt she is remembering that night long ago—the 
music and the moonlight and all the rest of it. Here 
is proof of the power of mental communication. The 
good lady passes the message over to me. Let me rub 
my glasses a moment in pleasant anticipation. I 
read: 

“You went away this morning without leaving me 
any money. I must have ten dollars to pay a few 
little bills!” 

Remembering happier days appears to be a special 
privilege of the deaf! 


CHAPTER XVII 


“The Terror That Flieth By Night” 

The Terror that Flieth by Night—’Gene Wilson in the Dark 
Silence—How He Fought off Insanity—Childhood Fears 
—The Cat in the Garret—The Blind and the Deaf at the 
Dark Railroad Station—A Georgia Experience. 

The sense of utter helplessness and the heart chill 
which envelop a deaf person suddenly plunged into 
darkness are indescribable. For example, of course, 
I know perfectly well that the darkness does not of 
itself carry evil or extra danger; I have come 
through it repeatedly without harm, yet in spite of 
all that I can think or do I invariably experience an 
instant of paralyzing fear. Persons who have never 
known perfect hearing do not feel the full terror, I 
think, but there is tragedy in the sudden withdrawal 
of light for those who have gradually, perhaps im¬ 
perceptibly, come to substitute eyes for ears. They 
may recover their mental poise after a moment of 
mental struggle but for a brief space, before they 
can adjust the mind, they will come close to insanity. 
I can assure you that at such a time the moments 
are hours. 

I know of at least one deaf man, a farmer, who 

256 


257 


"the terror that flieth by night” 

will vouch for the truth of my statements, though 
you with good ears may contend that it is fantastic 
to be so affected. ’Gene Wilson had come to depend 
on his wife and children as interpreters in his com¬ 
munications with others. Many a deaf person has 
lost the habit of listening, of paying close attention, 
through his perfect confidence in the family inter¬ 
preter. In any case, many men of middle age are in¬ 
clined to shirk the responsibility of effort if they can 
find some one willing to assume it. The deaf man 
loses his will to hear if not his actual hearing, the 
man of middle years thus is inviting old age; both by 
effort could extend the "years of grace.” ’Gene Wil¬ 
son had sent a car load of potatoes to the city and 
had followed to sell them, with his wife and little 
girl. During the crowded noon hour he attempted 
to cross Broadway at Forty-second Street. A police¬ 
man stood on guard to direct the traffic, but ’Gene 
did not understand the signals. He tried to run 
across just as a big car started uptown—of course 
the policeman shouted, but ’Gene could not hear 
him. The driver could not stop in time and the deaf 
man was smashed to the ground, where he lay 
stunned and bleeding. There was the usual call for 
an ambulance, and ’Gene was hurried to a hospital. 
The deaf do not cry out when injured or frightened; 
probably they lose the habit of this form of expres¬ 
sion since they do not hear others use it. Instead 
there comes a whirling, a roaring of the head and a 


2 5 § 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


sort of mild paralysis of the brain, but when this 
clears away it leaves the mind most acute and active. 
’Gene Wilson lay in this half-dazed condition, con¬ 
scious only of a fearful pounding at his brain. The 
doctors questioned him, but he did not hear. They 
finally put him down as idiotic or at least half-in¬ 
sane. Several deaf friends have told me how this 
label was attached to them when they met with ac¬ 
cidents while among strangers. One can scarcely 
blame hurried, over-worked hospital doctors and 
nurses for paying scant attention to such cases, and 
the afflicted must suffer. 

So they bandaged poor 'Gene’s head in such a way 
that his eyes were covered. What difference could 
seeing make to a half-wit? How were those doc¬ 
tors to know how much more the blessed sunshine 
meant to this deaf man than it could possibly mean 
to them? And then ’Gene’s mind suddenly cleared. 
His head was racked by pain and the roaring still 
sounded in his ears, but he remembered back to the 
moment before the accident—and now he found him- 
» suddenly helpless, in the darkness. He forgot 
the usual caution of the deaf and shouted! The 
nurses came running and tried to make him under¬ 
stand, but a new terror possessed him. He tore at 
the bandages which covered his eyes, but strong 
hands held him back; he fought with all his power, 
lying there in the darkness and the silence, but how 
were the nurses to understand that he was only 


“the terror that flietii by night" 259 

fighting for the sunshine? None of their explana¬ 
tions pacified him, so they strapped his arms se¬ 
curely to the bed and held him a prisoner. Who 
knows what their report might have been? 

’Gene Wilson tells me that a full thousand years 
of torment were crowded for him in the next half 
hour. He thinks that Dante missed one act in his 
description of life in the infernal regions! ’Gene 
says that frightful shapes stepped out of the shadows 
and seemed to lead him along a lonely road, up close 
to a great house with transparent sides through 
which he could look upon the grotesque shapes which 
dwelt therein. Part of his mind seemed to know 
that it was the home of insanity. Faces peered at him 
through the windows; some stared in a stupor of 
melancholy, others showed grinning deviltry or hate¬ 
ful sneering, and all were waiting to welcome him! 
And all around poor ’Gene were kindly souls eager 
to hell) him and to draw him away from the awful 
place, but he could not make them understand that 
he was not insane—only deaf. 

“You may believe it or not," says ’Gene, going on 
with his story, “but as I stood there struggling to 
get rid of those shapes at my sides my mind searched 
for a strong, sane picture which should counteract 
the spell of the evil ones. Suddenly there came to 
me the Twenty-third Psalm, which as a boy I had 
committed to memory. It had been lying forgotten 
at the back of my mind, but at that awful moment 



26 o 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


it returned complete and distinct. 1 lay there 
(juietly, repeating the words over and over. 

“The Lord is my Shepherd; I shall not want. He 
maketh me to lie down in green pastures, He leadeth 
me beside the still waters. He restoreth my soul; 
He leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for His 
name’s sake. Yea, though I walk through the valley 
of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for Thou 
art with me. Thy rod and Thy staff they comfort 
me.” 

I told ’Gene that here was evidence of the sub¬ 
conscious mind throwing up something which had 
been buried deep into it years before. 

“I know nothing about that,” said he; “but as I 
lay there repeating those words over and over a 
great peace came to me. The shapes at my side 
disappeared, and I could walk away from that 
frightful place. Then I felt a hand on my head 
which somehow I recognized, and another smaller 
hand caught at my thumb. They loosened those 
hateful bandages and let in the light. Then I saw— 
as I seemed to know I should—my wife sitting beside 
me, and the little girl holding my hand.” 

I could assure ’Gene that I completely believed 
his story, for I have also felt the strong emotions 
and imaginings which stir the deaf at such times. 
Always the head noises grow louder when light is 
withdrawn from our hearing eyes, and the voices 
which go with subjective hearing become more pro- 


ff THE TERROR THAT FLIETH BY NIGHT” 26l 

nounced. Probably the deaf are more sensitive to 
subconscious thought than are those who hear well; 
we are deprived of much of the sound which stimu¬ 
lates many trains of conscious thought. Also we 
deaf must naturally deal with the past where most 
subconscious thought is buried. I believe that the 
deaf hold very closely to memories and associations 
of childhood—our long, quiet hours of reflection are 
largely filled with remembering the most vivid im¬ 
pressions we have received. 

Perhaps this accounts for some of the terror which 
the darkness brings. Many of us remember the hor¬ 
rible shapes which peopled the black night around 
our beds, and lurked in shadowy corners, often 
emerging to dance grotesquely in the moonlight. 
When I was the “boy” on a New England farm there 
was only one room in the house which was reason¬ 
ably warm in Winter, but at eight o’clock the old 
farmer would point with unmistakable significance 
to the tall clock in the corner, and there was nothing 
for me to do but to rush through the cold parlor, 
up the colder stairs into the still colder attic, where 
my bed was in the shadow of the great central chim¬ 
ney. Needless to say, I undressed in bed. Then 
down under the covers I lay and trembled at the 
snap of the frost. Once a piece of plaster fell from 
the unfinished wall above me and struck my shoul¬ 
der ; again “Malty,” the gray cat, crawled in 
through a hole in the roof and sprang upon my bed, 


262 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


striking terror to my soul, though she really came 
as an old friend. The appearance of this unknown 
crawling thing on my bed inspired a frenzy of fear— 
but I knew that it would do me no good to scream or 
call for help. My aunt was deaf, while my uncle 
slept like the proverbial log; both log and deaf ear 
are alike, unresponsive to sound. Also, I realized 
that the journey downstairs with my story would 
have been unprofitable (and freezing!) I should 
have been sent back with a scolding and perhaps a 
blow. My own little children sometimes waken in 
the night with some of these vague terrors, and I 
have known them to run through the dark to their 
mother’s bed, where they are always taken in. My 
old folks were not cruel or even consciously unkind; 
they merely lived in an arid region where under¬ 
standing and imagination could not come. They 
knew nothing of ghosts and goblins, so why should 
0 child fear them? Darkness was really a good 
thing, if one didn’t waste lamp oil. So I lay alone 
with the terrors until sleep banished them. I could 
not see that they must be futile, since such an unsub¬ 
stantial foe as sleep could master them. 

Of course, thousands of grey-haired persons can 
recall just such terrifying childhood situations. 
Usually as we grow older the memories fade away, 
though they are never entirely lost; they are prob¬ 
ably waiting in the subconsciousness for darkness 
and a worried mind to bring them forth. They are 


"the terror that flieth by night" 263 


clearer to the deaf, and nearer to the surface of 
consciousness; hence they are more easily roused 
to play their strange tricks upon us. It seems 
strange to me that novelists have rather neglected 
this strong emotion of fear, and it is particularly 
remarkable that they have seemed to slight the 
mighty struggle to overcome it, which all deaf people 
know. 


Ci 




Some years ago I planned to visit a New England 
town to attend a college celebration. I had never 
been in this particular locality before, but I sup¬ 
posed I should find a large town with full hotel 
accommodations, so I took a night train. At about 
eleven I alighted at the railroad station, and, to my 
astonishment, found myself in complete darkness. 
The train made but a brief stop; it hurried off like 
a living thing, glad to escape from the lonely place. 
I watched the last glimmer of its rear light disap¬ 
pear around a distant curve, and then I was com¬ 
pletely wrapped in a dense, inky blackness, through 
which I could feel the moist fingers of a thick, creep¬ 
ing fog. They seemed to clutch at my face and 
throat. For an instant the old wild terror seized 
me, and then there came an impulse to rush through 
the blackness desperately—anywhere—to escape the 
clinging things which seemed to be reaching for me. 
But I stood still, and finally there came to me a sort 
of amused sense of adventure—I remembered the 
night in the hotel when I wandered about the dark 


264 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


passage and ran into a drunken man. The light 
sobered him, and as he led me back to my room he 
thanked me, for he said that his wife was waiting 
up for him. 

Now my first thought was to locate the railroad 
station. That would at least prove a starting point; 
but I had absolutely no idea in which direction to 
start, for I could not even tell whether any buildings 
at all were near. The last light on the train had 
traveled east, but I had turned around several times 
since I watched it out of sight. I dared not call 
out; I remembered the deaf man who was shot and 
nearly killed under similar circumstances. Being 
lost in the darkness, he called for help, not knowing 
that he was near a farmhouse. The farmer heard 
him and pointed a gun from the window, calling: 

“What do you want? Stand still or IT 1 fire!” 

The deaf man continued to advance; the farmer 
fired at random and shot him down. I knew better 
than to call out in the darkness. I did not even dare 
walk freely about, for I know of a man who in the 
darkness about a railroad station ran into a mowing- 
machine; another became entangled in a roll of 
barbed wire. These incidents stayed in my mind 
quite vividly, and I will confess that I got down on 
my hands and knees and crawled carefully in what 
I hoped was the direction of the station. Foot by 
foot I crept along, and at last I came up against 
what I took to be a picket fence. Then a dull light 


"the terror that flieth by night” 265 

began to glow down the track. The midnight freight 
rumbled by, and its headlight showed the station 
behind me. I had crossed the road In my travels, 
and now I slowly recrossed it. With arms out¬ 
stretched, I ran into the building. I carefully groped 
my way around it, much as a blind man would have 
felt his way along a wall. But he would travel with 
greater confidence, trusting to his ears to warn him 
of approaching danger. 1 passed one corner and 
proceeded to the other side, but suddenly there came 
to me a feeling that someone was near me in the 
dark! I cannot describe the uncanny, “crawly” sen¬ 
sation which envelops a deaf person when he senses 
an unseen presence. I suffered acutely until I actu¬ 
ally ran into a man who also seemed to be feeling 
his way along the wall. He told me afterward that 
he had spoken to me several times, but, of course, 
I did not answer. Happily he had no pistol or he 
would have fired. As it was, each clutched the throat 
of the other, and we struggled like two wild animals. 
1 had the stronger grip, and I think I know the vul¬ 
nerable point in the throat. At any rate, his hand 
dropped, and I knew from the quiver inside his 
throat that he was gasping for breath. 

Then I told him who I was and what was my 
trouble. After a little fumbling I got my hearing 
device into working order and held up the mouth¬ 
piece to his mouth. At first he thought it was a 
pistol, but I reassured him, and he told me his story. 


266 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


Like myself, lie had come on tlie late train, expecting 
to find a town, and a good hotel near the station 
And it happened that he was nearly blind; he 
retained only part of the sight in one eye. He told 
me that he had heard me walking about in the dark 
and had called loudly. There we were—a man 
nearly blind and a deaf man, stranded in this lonely 
place. If ever two human beings had need of each 
other, we were the men, yet a moment before both 
of us were ready to fight when co-operation was the 
only possible hope for us. This is not unlike the 
larger struggles that go on in the world. 

We agreed to graft the blind man’s ears upon my 
eyes, and together we made our way slowly along 
the road. Our hope was to start up some dog at a 
farmhouse, rouse the family by any means, and plead 
for lodging. Finally, far down the road I saw a 
moving light. I judged it to be a lantern in the hand 
of a farmer going to the barn for a last look at the 
cattle before retiring. I know that New England 
habit. So I called and the blind man listened. The 
light stopped moving at my call, and a big voice 
roared back: 

“What do you want at this time of night?” 

I explained as best I could, but it was hard to 
convince that farmer. 

“Too thin! I’ve heard such tales before! Stop 
where you are till I come back.” 

The lantern moved back to the house, and we 


267 


"the terror that flieth by night" 

waited in tlie road. Soon three lights appeared and 
moved towards us. That farmer had called up his 
son and the hired man, and as they moved down 
the road in our direction I thought of “The Night 
Watch"—a fine picture I had seen at an exhibition. 
The farmer carried a shotgun, the boy had an old 
musket, and the hired man brandished a pitchfork. 
When we came within range of the lantern, the 
farmer ordered us to hold up our hands while we 
explained; the hired man meanwhile advanced with 
bis pitchfork extended as if to throw half a haycock 
on a w T agon. These men could not be blamed for 
their caution, for, as we later learned, thieves had 
been busy in the neighborhood. We finally convinced 
the belligerents that we were harmless. The farmer 
left us under the guard of the hired man while he 
went to his barn and harnessed a horse. Then he 
carried us to the distant town, where we routed out 
a sleepy landlord and ended our adventure. But 
the farmer gave us a bit of homely advice. 

“If I was a deaf man, or if I had only half an 
eye, I’d stay at home when night comes." 

“But in that case you would miss a good deal of 
life—many adventures, and many new friends." 

“Well, maybe that’s so; I hadn’t thought of that." 

He departed shaking his head over the advantages 
of adventurous blood, but I think he possessed a 
dash of it himself. 

A friend of mine tells a Georgia experience of 



268 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


deafness and darkness. Long after dark he reached 
the small town where he was to spend the night. 
However black true “pitch” may be, there never was 
anything darker than that portion of the atmosphere 
which surrounded the railroad station as this deaf 
man stepped off the train. Finally a light appeared 
from behind the station. It proved to be a dim 
lantern in the hands of a colored man so black that 
his face seemed to make a shadow in the dark. 
Conversation with the deaf regarding details is not 
satisfactory under such conditions. The colored man 
held his lantern up near to his face and talked, but 
his mouth was too large and open to make lip-read¬ 
ing easy. The deaf man did finally grasp the fact 
that this agent of the night represented the leading 
hotel in town. So, under his guidance my friend 
found his way to an old closed carriage. The colored 
man hung his lantern on a spring, roused his sleepy 
mule, and off they started over a succession of humps 
and mud holes. Finally, after one tremendous bump, 
the lonely lantern went out and the carriage halted. 
The deaf man could distinguish ahead only two 
luminous spots of light; they were the eyes of the 
mule, who, instead of running as a horse might have 
done, merely looked reproachfully at his driver. The 
colored man had no matches, but he drove on through 
the blackness, placidly trusting to the mule for guid 
ance. Now there are times in the life of every deaf 
man when he must either aspire to philosophy or 


"the terror that flieth by night” . 269 

retire into insanity. My friend, inside of that rickety 
carriage, smiled at the thought which entered his 
mind. Ages before one of his stone age ancestors 
had crouched far back on his bed of leaves, shrink¬ 
ing in terror at the evil spirits which the darkness 
was hiding. Here he Tvas in the silent darkness after 
all the long ages, but he was serene in soul because 
hundreds of years of artificial light had brought 
to him their message of courage and faith. 

The “hotel” proved to be an old-fashioned South¬ 
ern mansion, rambling and shaky, fronted by large 
unpainted columns which sagged a bit, with win¬ 
dows that rattled and big echoing halls in which old 
memories congregated. My friend was tired, and 
after a light supper he asked to be taken to his room. 
The landlord, a grave and dignified man, who limped 
a little from a wound received at Gettysburg, took 
up a lighted candle and led the way to a big corner 
room at the back of the house on the first floor. He 
put the candle and the matches down on the bureau 
and then pulled out a revolver, which he placed 
beside the candle. 

“We have been having a little trouble with some 
of our niggers,” he said. “They steal. Keep your 
windows fastened, and put your watch and money 
under your pillow. If anyone should get in, fire 
first and inquire afterward. That is our plan. 
Goodnight.” 

This deaf man hardly knows how to fire a modern 


270 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


revolver. It is doubtful if he could come anywhere 
near to a barn door in sunlight, to say nothing of 
the inky blackness which encompassed that house. 
However, he obediently put his valuables under the 
pillow, placed the big revolver carefully on the chair 
beside his bed, blew out the light and retired. In 
such a situation it seems to me that keen, quick 
ears would have been a misfortune. And this deaf 
man, being philosophical as well as very weary, fell 
asleep before he could fully realize the surrounding 
conditions. 

How long he slept he cannot now tell, but he sud¬ 
denly woke with a start and sat up in bed, knowing 
that someone was within a few feet of him. I know 
that both the blind and the deaf have a curious 
faculty of divining the presence of others in the 
silence of the darkness. My friend knew that some¬ 
where in the silent darkness human beings were go¬ 
ing through some stealthy performance. He reached 
for the revolver, but the chair upon ichich he had 
placed it was not there! As quietly as possible he 
groped his way to the bureau and found the matches. 
But it was impossible to light them. He scratched 
at least a dozen until they broke in two, but they 
would not ignite. The candle was in his hand, but 
the light within, which he craved, could not be pro¬ 
duced. Alone in the silent blackness, a numb terror 
fell upon the heart of the deaf man. He was as help¬ 
less as his remote ancestor, shrinking into his pri- 


2/1 


"the terror that flieth by night" 

meval black cave. He was even in a worse situation, 
for the cave man had hearing with which to note 
the approach of his enemy. The modern man would 
not know how near was the lurking enemy until he 
felt the clutching hand. He dared not cry out or 
grope for help through that rambling house—the 
landlord had stipulated that questions be asked 
afterward! Finally, urged on by that mysterious 
instinct of the deaf, he groped his way along the 
hall until he reached the corner window. This he 
opened, and he stood there waiting for the terror to 
reveal itself. Suddenly he perceived that someone 
had passed close to him through the outside dark¬ 
ness—he even felt a slight movement of air as some¬ 
thing passed by; he thought a human hand was laid 
on the window sill for an instant. With eyes 
strained to the limit of tension and ears quickened 
a little by terror, the deaf man realized that a door 
near him had gently opened. Then came a dim 
sound and the air waves of a struggle, and the deaf 
man knew that someone was creeping back past 
him through the darkness. As startling as would 
have been a nail driven into his heart came the 
thud and the shock of a quick blow on the side of 
the house nearest him—a low, stifled cry penetrated 
even his dull ears. Then off again crept a human 
form, feeling its way along the house. 

No, the deaf man did not dream all this. It all 
happened just as I relate it. Out in that silent 



2 72 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


blackness a tragedy had been enacted. After a time 
the deaf man cautiously put his hand out of the 
window down toward the place where that quick 
blow had fallen. His reaching fingers slowly crept 
down past the sill to the wooden post upon which 
the house was built. There they encountered a soft, 
warm, sticky smear, which coated the top of the post. 
The fingers did not dare to close. The horror- 
stricken, lonely man held his right hand rigid and 
suffered one of those crises when either philosophy 
or insanity must come to the aid of the deaf. He 
determined to keep his mind clear. Finally he became 
aware that light was coming; off in the east a crim¬ 
son streak appeared along the sky; the wind was 
blowing the mists away. Little by little the light 
gained. The man looked at his hand, and, as he had 
feared, it showed a red stain. The light grew, and 
he finally gained courage to look out of the window. 
The post was covered with blood. There was still 
visible the mark of a blow of an axe. Just back 
from the corner was a small house, within which a 
rooster was crowing—half a dozen hens were on 
their way out for the day’s wanderings. In the door 
of a small cook-house in the backyard a fat colored 
woman was picking a Plymouth Rock chicken. The 
deaf man glanced once more at the house post and 
saw on the ground beside it the head of a rooster! 

It was a thoughtful man who washed his hands 
and looked about the room. The revolver still lay 


2 73 


"the terror that flieth by night" 

on the chair where he had placed it; he had evidently 
put his hand out on the wrong side of the bed. 
There was the candle and there were the matches—• 
untouched; near at hand was a ~box of toothpicks, 
half of them broken in pieces, with scratches on the 
box. 

Later the deaf man sat out in the gallery, watch¬ 
ing the sun rise, his mind busy with strange matters 
as he waited for breakfast. At length the landlord 
appeared. 

“I hope, sir, you rested well. I feared you might 
be disturbed. We wanted to give you a taste of 
fried chicken, Georgia style, so the nigger killed 
one this morning. I hope it did not disturb you, 
sir." 


CHAPTER XVIII 


“Grouch” or Gentleman 

When a man becomes convinced that he is 
definitely headed for the silence, he must make up 
his mind whether he is to be a grouch or a gentle¬ 
man. The word “grouch” has not yet been fully 
accepted by the guardians of good English, but it 
seems to me one of the most expressive words in the 
language. Perhaps that is because I have spent 
much time in trying to escape from the condition 
which might probably carry this label. The deaf 
man may, if he will, excel all others in playing the 
part. Here is one case in which he may certainly 
pose as a star. It is hardly possible for a grouch 
to be a gentleman, and it is quite inconceivable that 
the gentleman should wish to be a grouch. Yet, if 
left to himself, the deaf man will naturally come to 
play the part, and it is certainly the one part in the 
great adventure of life which he can handle to per¬ 
fection. The grouch wraps himself in a mantle of 
gloom and tries to throw the skirts of it all around 
his fellow-men. The gentleman, when under the 
spell of affliction, struggles to light a candle of faith 
and hope within him that will make his whole life 
luminous as he walks among men. It costs most of 

274 


“grouch” or gentleman 275 

us a struggle in our efforts to throw off depression 
and appear content with life, and the struggle will 
be long and constant, but it is worth while, and so 
in this last chapter I would like to briefly review 
some of the rules of life which have come home to me 
during my sojourn in silence. I have found in my 
own case that I paid very little attention to the 
rules and regulations of the trouble, but, at any 
rate, those of us who have been over the ground like 
to nail up the danger signal when we can. 

The deaf should remember that they are in a way 
abnormal. We cannot be like other men. It could 
not well be otherwise when we realize that we are 
deprived of what is perhaps the most important of 
the senses. It seems to me far better to face the 
fact that we cannot well conceal our handicap. 
Usually when we mingle with others in everyday life 
every person within 100 feet of us will know sooner 
or later that we are deaf. Some of the worst blun¬ 
ders which the deaf man can make are those which 
come from pretending that he can hear. We shall 
receive better treatment and be freer from disap¬ 
pointment if we frankly admit our handicap and 
throw ourselves upon the generosity of our friends, 
or even of strangers. 

I suppose that curiosity causes more real torture 
to the deaf man than anything else. Some of the 
deaf are exceedingly curious. They must know what 
others are talking about, and they often pester their 


276 ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 

companions almost beyond endurance in an effort 
to learn all the trivial details of small conversation. 
They bring themselves to believe that most conver¬ 
sation going on about them refers to something in 
which they are vitally interested, and in this way 
they come to imagine all sorts of disagreeable 
things. This idle curiosity leads to endless grief 
and trouble. Forget it! That brief advice is 
peculiarly applicable to the deaf, for it is much 
harder for them to forget things than for those 
whose minds are constantly diverted by sound. One 
of the greatest troubles of the average deaf man 
is that he cannot forget the things which annoy 
except by driving them out of the brain by new sug¬ 
gestions, or by forcing himself to think of happier 
and more interesting things. That is why every deaf 
person should have some harmless or interesting 
hobby which he can always mount and spur into 
speed whenever the imps of the silence come out of 
their holes. Yet, there is such a thing as riding a 
hobby so hard that the rider loses his hat, and the 
deaf man makes a very ridiculous John Gilpin when 
his hobby runs away with him. 

Above all things, we must believe in the loyalty 
and affection of our family and companions. Remem¬ 
ber that they are human, perhaps more so than we 
are. We can easily become a nuisance to them. 
They may perhaps show their annoyance for the 
moment, but at heart they are true, and we should 


“grouch” or gentleman 277 

never lose faith in them, if we can possibly avoid 
it. I think, too, it is a mistake to allude to our 
trouble as an affliction, as too many of us are 
tempted to do. It is a handicap, and often a very 
serious one. Yet, we may easily find people with 
real afflictions, worse than ours, and we well know 
that we would not readily change our identity if 
such a thing could be done. I find that successful 
teachers of lip-reading insist that deafness should 
never be spoken of as an affliction. It is a handicap, 
perhaps, but the surest way to make it worse is to 
go about classing the deaf with afflicted people; and 
the intelligent deaf scarcely, if ever, speak of those 
who are deaf and dumb. That is a term to be 
avoided, for education or scientific treatment is 
ending that condition. The entire life of the deaf, 
if they hope to enjoy even ordinary happiness, must 
be built on the sunshine theory; always search for 
the bright side. In all our life there is nothing so 
destructive of character as self-pity. Far better 
look about for undoubted advantages of life in the 
silence, and train our rebellious spirits to work 
patiently under the yoke. In that way we may 
easily gain new strength of character and greater 
power from our trouble. I like to repeat the states 
ment over and over that I have found this a good 
world. It is well filled with kindly people, who 
on the whole are ready to give every man with a 
handicap a fair start if they can only be made to 


278 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


realize that he is willing to fight the good fight with 
cheerfulness and without complaint. 

I have found it well to go out among my fellow 
men and take my chances on getting through. Some 
people seem to think that deafness should shut them 
away from travel or society. I cannot agree with 
that. I think we should move about among people. 
It is, I grant, a peculiar sensation at times to realize 
the appalling loneliness of a crowd. You stand in 
groups of people, see them move about, know that 
they are talking and laughing; you can reach out 
your hand and touch them; yet, for all that, you are 
living in another world apart from them. It gives 
one at times an uncanny feeling to realize such a 
situation, yet I think it is well for us to seek our 
fellows in this way, and live among them. It gives 
us opportunity for the finest study of character, and 
if we would only think so, there are few things more 
interesting or exciting than the attempt to locate 
strangers in occupation or habit by their appear¬ 
ance. Some deaf people seek to hide themselves, 
and shun society and travel through fear of ridicule 
or accident. This is, I believe, a mistake. So long 
as one has eyes of reasonable strength which may 
be trained for quick and close observation, it is far 
better for the mind and spirit to get out among men. 
When you go on a journey, always plan to carry a 
flashlight lantern and an abundant supply of 
paper and pencils. You are quite sure at some pomt 


“grouch” or gentleman 279 

of your travels to find yourself in darkness along 
the way, and there is little hope for the deaf man 
in the dark. Unless you are expert at lip-reading, 
my advice would be to insist upon having the mes¬ 
sage written out. With the very deaf attempts to 
make them hear or to communicate by signs are 
little better than wide guesses. In all my experi¬ 
ences I have never found but two people who refused 
to write the information when I called for it One 
was an impatient, selfish man, and the other a 
woman, who evidently feared that certain young 
men would laugh at her if she made herself con¬ 
spicuous with a deaf man. In one of these cases a by¬ 
stander, seemingly ashamed of the discourtesy shown 
me, volunteered to help me, and was ready to fight 
the man who had refused. Oh, I shall have to repeat 
it once more! I have found this a good world to 
live in. It is filled with people who at heart are 
kindly and sympathetic. Many of the fancied rebuffs 
which we experience are due to the fact that people 
do not understand how to communicate with us. 
Above all things, the deaf man should never lose his 
nerve. He should always believe that he is the 
favorite “child of fate,” sure to come through every 
obstacle. Then let him go bravely and confidently 
on his way, supremely sure that he will be cared for. 

The problem of occupation is the vital one for 
the deaf. What can we do to earn a living when 
our hearing fails? There is without question a 


28 o 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


prejudice against the deaf which it is hard to 
overcome. We who live in the silence cannot quite 
understand why people seem to fear us, and are 
evidently uncomfortable when we come near. We 
are as harmless as anyone, and we are capable of 
giving good service, but we realize only too well that 
society in general seems to class us among the unde¬ 
sirables. I know of one woman who is struggling 
to support and educate two children. She is an 
admirable cook, good housekeeper, clean, quick and 
efficient, yet no one wants to employ her because 
she is deaf. One would think that her condition 
would be something of an advantage in a household 
where there are family secrets to be kept. But, no 
matter how capable this woman may be, most people 
seem afraid to employ her. The fact is that the 
condition of deafness is a distinct advantage in 
many cases—for example, the faithful deaf helper 
will not be liable to change frequently. He will stay 
by his employer, yet most deaf people come face to 
face with prejudice wffiich society show T s them. 

I know of a clergyman who filled his pulpit 
acceptably until deafness drove him from it. One 
might think without bitterness that a man of God 
wdth a trouble of this sort might in his daily life 
come closer to w r hat his people need, but his congre¬ 
gation would not have it so, and he was retired. 
For some years the old man lived in the town, saw¬ 
ing and splitting wood for a living. The woodpile 
he built was a sermon on neatness and honest labor, 


“grouch” or gentleman 281 

and lie went happily on through life. Someone asked 
him how he could be cheerful at such labor, and his 
answer was: “I put joy in my job.” There are deaf 
men in all walks of life. Some are highly successful 
as teachers, editors, salesmen, watchmen and other 
lines where one would suppose that perfect hearing 
is more than a necessity. In general a deaf man must 
take the work that comes to him. He cannot always 
choose, but he can usually dignify any job, and excel 
at it if he will keep his courage and put his mind 
to it. He should remember that spirit of the old 
minister who, when retired from his pulpit, took up 
the saw and axe, and was cheerful because he put 
joy in the job. 

The moving picture show is a wonderful help to 
the deaf. Here he is on terms of equality with all 
men. In this remarkable world of the movies, where 
the villain is always punished and the virtuous 
always emerge with roses and a crown, the deaf 
man may find much of that optimism which seems 
like an electric light to the soul. It is the height 
of enjoyment for him to see pictures illustrating 
some favorite book thrown on the screen, and that 
enables him to make a mental comparison with his 
own conception of the characters in the story. The 
fact is that the life of the ambitious deaf is one long 
effort to keep cheerful and bright-minded, and thus 
steer away from depression. To that end he should 
soak his mind with all possible poetry and humor 


282 


ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 


and good literature. In fact, let him take in any¬ 
thing that will frame pleasant pictures on the walls 
of his mind, and it is a blessing ranking close to a 
godsend to be able to sleep when other aids in the 
struggle against depression fail. There will surely 
come times after the work has been laid aside when 
all the wakeful philosophy will fail to keep the spirit 
bright. Then the ability to lie down and sleep 
becomes a genuine heavenly gift; for in sleep the 
head noises and troubles are forgotten, when we 
may even hear music and voices of friends. And 
do you know that in that thought lies one of the 
most curious and pathetic things connected with 
the life of the deaf? We wonder just how the voices 
of wife and son or friends actually sound. In real 
fact they may croak like ravens or scream like a 
door that needs oiling, but to us in imagination they 
are musical and full of sympathy. I think that of 
all the curious, mysterious things which come to us 
in this world of silence there is nothing sadder or 
more remarkable than this unsatisfied desire to 
listen to the actual tones which ring in the voices of 
those we love. 

It is without doubt true that the deaf are closer 
to subconscious thought than those who have perfect 
hearing. It seems to be easier for us to go back to 
childhood or to raise into the mind memories of 
other days. It often becomes a wonder to me that 
old friends forget so many of the scenes and sayings 


“grouch” or gentleman 383 

of youth. I presume they have more to distract their 
attention. It seems to me that the useless or trivial 
conversation which most people indulge in must in 
time dilute or distort memory and drive away the 
pictures of youth. With the deaf these pictures 
seem to grow clearer with each year, and this, I take 
it, is one of the compensations which accompany 
the trouble. For as we march along the road and 
reach a hill from which we begin to see the end, I 
think it must be a lonely road which those must 
travel who have forgotten the pictures and com¬ 
panions of their youth. It is practically impossible 
for the deaf to weep as others do. They are for the 
most part denied what I may call the healing balm 
of tears, unless there can occur some great shock, 
some volcanic eruption of emotion which breaks 
down the dam and lets in the flood upon a dry desert 
of lonely years. But the deaf man who has kept his 
mind cleanly occupied and his spirit bright may 
find in happy memories a joy of life which others 
rarely know. 

“Sometimes when night pulls down the shade after 
a weary day, 

1 sit beside mv open fire and watch the shadows 
play. 

Then memory takes me by the hand, and happily we 

go 

Back to the kindly days of youth—when I was 
Mary’s beau. 


284 ADVENTURES IN SILENCE 

Oh! Mary! In those golden years, when you and I 
were young, 

When all the symphonies of youth by hopeful lips 
were sung, 

When every avenue of life led out to rosy skies, 

And fortune’s fingers dangled there the gifts that 
all men prize! 

Old Time is kind. He hides the years which bear the 
loss and stain, 

And only those which shine with love and happiness 
remain. 

As one may find a violet beneath the Winter’s snow, 

I go back to the kindly years—when I was Mary’s 
beau. 

I was a chunky farmer boy—her father lord of lands. 

She was a little village queen—I only had my hands. 

Yet in the pure democracy of our New England town 

Youth never could be quite denied—love beat the 
barriers down. 

Yet she was wise—to reign a queen—one must keep 
step with wealth. 

And Mary knew full well that I had nothing but my 
health. 

To me she played a sister’s part—but settled down 
with Joe, 

I went out West with but a dream that I was Mary’s 
beau. 

I’ve journeyed East, I’ve journeyed West—I’ve had 
my hour of life. 

I’ve lingered in the pleasant ways—I’ve faced the 
storm and strife. 


“grouch” or gentleman 285 

Fame, wealth, have missed me and yet they will envy 
me I know, 

Those days back in the golden years—when I was 
Mary’s beau. 

i 

No, no, dear wife, deny me not these fair old dreams 
of youth, 

You well may smile, for life has taught the patience 
and the truth. 

Time tried, long tested, up the hill we’ve journeyed 
side by side, 

Or drifted in the ebb and flow of fortune’s fateful 
tide. 

The years may come, the years may go, yet love will 
find the test. 

Youth’s dreams are good, yet that which lives on 
life’s hard road is best, 

And so you grant me my romance—perhaps I do not 
know, 

You, too, are thinking of the days when you were 
Henry’s beau. 

And so I sit beside the fire when night pulls down 
the blind, 

And wander back to youth once more with all my 
cares behind. 

The winds of trouble rage outside, we care not how 
they blow, 

Back in those golden days of youth—when I was 
Mary’s beau.” 











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